Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

It’s pruning season, again. No, not for my roses or my fruit trees (that’s February); it’s the season to prune my Facebook friends list.

During the year, my list accretes new names—distant relations who pop up after an auntie mentioned a connection, or a friend of a friend who saw a comment I made or who remembers my name from school days—and some of them work out fine. Usually, though . . . not.

Thus, with each new year, along with cleaning out old utility bills from my filing cabinet, I now also review my friends list with an eye toward clearing out the dead wood.

I’ve never been one to have a lot of friends. As an introvert of the first water, I’ve always preferred a small and trusted cadre of kindred spirits to a horde of smiling faces eager to share their every thought. The fact that I have over a hundred names on my friends list (not much over, but over) seems ridiculous to me. I may know a few hundred people, I may be acquainted with them, but friends? As for those folks who have hundreds or even a thousand “friends,” well, aside from the fact that I don’t think that word means what you think it means, there’s no way I could keep up with the posts, memes, comments, and social media “challenges” that would be thrown out there by so many.

And so, come January, I start pruning.

My Stay/Go criteria is neither draconian nor complicated.

1. If I see you in person (that’s IRL for you kids) at least once a year, you stay.
2. If we correspond (email or letter) beyond a mass-mailed holiday newsletter, you stay.
3. If you’ve commented on my posts in the past year (and I haven’t had to delete them), you stay.
4. If I’ve commented on your posts and you’ve responded/reacted, you stay.
5. If we’re related (up to the third degree) and you haven’t pissed me off more than twice all year, you stay.
6. If you’re dead and it’s been less than a year, you stay; if it’s been over a year and I now think of you only with fondness, you stay.

Essentially, it boils down to this: To remain my friend, you occasionally have to interact with me.

(I admit, criterion #6 is a bit of an outlier, but friends do sometimes die, and the fact is, if I enjoyed their friendship when they were alive, deleting them from my list is like deleting them from my personal history. Death does not remove you from my life, but it is a very good excuse for not posting on Facebook.)

This year, as I was pruning my list (and thanks to an add-in I use to block all the ads and frippery that clogs my Facebook feed), I also learned that some folks were making similar cuts to their friends lists. While everyone’s criteria is going to be different, I can’t say I disagree with those who decided to cull me. We weren’t close, not really, and if we once were, we aren’t now.

So my list is now down to a believable one-hundred-ten names (including two dear departed friends). About 15% of those names are still on waivers, but they have until next year to up their game.

While this may sound like I’m setting up some sort of snooty-nosed elitist micro-society, I’m not. Nor am I creating my own personal echo chamber. I mean, if you never interact with me, never talk to me, then what’s the point? I’m not here just to be a notch on your belt, and I sure as hell don’t keep that kind of score.

To me, “friendship” is a relationship, a mutual connection expressed via an exchange of words, ideas, thoughts, concerns, and such. We can disagree. We can debate, even argue. Friendship is not all smooth sailing; there are squalls and patches of rough water in any deep relationship. I don’t mind that.

What I do mind is being put up on a shelf and ignored. I’m worth more than that.

k