Loose Connections

Pretty much everyone knows what happens when one of your electronic devices has a loose connection. If its a TV, the picture cuts in and out or the quality of it decreases, and if you leave it alone it only gets worse as time goes on. From my experience, that is the same thing with relationships as well.

When I was in Smithers I was never really that close to most of the people I called my friends, and as we all either went away to university or stayed in Smithers, I never kept a real good connection with them. This is where I have left my loose connections alone too long, and they have pretty much completely come apart. To be honest I never talk to anyone I graduated with, but none of them have ever even attempted to talk to me, so I am beyond the point of caring at this point. Let's just say there are only a couple people that I care about from Smithers outside of my immediate family.

I made a lot of friends at Trinity Western University that I have really solid connections with, some that I have made okay connections with, and others to whom that I was barely connected. This is where I get to see how each type of connection fairs. Many of my friends from Trinity knew that I was in Ontario for 8 months after I left Trinity in the spring of last year. 

The people that I had the strongest connection with were the ones that I could come back to Trinity and have a good conversation with. There is something about that connection that lets me to be who I really am with people. When I came back to Trinity to visit (twice so far), I had a really hard time talking to some of the people that I made okay connections with, but there were a few that I was able to have good conversations with. It's really awkward to start up conversation with someone that you haven't talked to in 8 months or more. With those that I barely connected with, it was almost impossible for me to talk to them. I have no idea what to say to them because they could be in a completely different stage of life from whence I last talked to them.

In Ontario I made a number of really good friends and a couple of okay friends. Now this is really what brought me to this whole realization. The friends that I made in Ontario were really good people, and they honestly cared about me and my life. When I left for Smithers on vacation, they would message me and ask me when I would be coming back. Recently I told them that I most likely would not be coming back this summer, a large number of them showed a genuine interest in what is going on in my life. Also, they initiated conversations.

I respect my friends in Ontario a lot, and I respect the friends at Trinity that I have a solid connection with. The hard part about making connections is keeping them up, I understand that, but when two people get to know each other I think they should be genuinely interested in the lives of those people. I struggle with this issue myself, because there are a number of people that I haven't made an effort to keep in touch with, but in pretty much every on of those cases, the other person has not shown interest themselves.

This whole issue has made me think a lot lately, and I am just wondering if maybe you guys can help me out with this? 

A couple questions that I'd like to have answered, preferably Anonymous on here, or else as a message on facebook:

Do you think that once a relationship has been created between two people, that they both should make an effort to maintain it?

Should I cut off my relationship with the people who do not initiate conversation or show any interest at all in my life?

Is this too much of a self-centered view of friendship?

Any other comments?