My Great Social Experiment

I don't have many quality friends on Facebook. Most of the people that I have on my friend's list are mostly mutual friends or (much more honestly) acquaintances. For a good while, this didn't bother me at all, since I was just randomly adding people relentlessly over the course of several months. However, now I have this lengthy list of strangers who are, apparently, deemed "friends" of mine. Only...they're not. Rather than to eliminate them from my friends list, I decided I would try to befriend them, to know a thing or two about who they are. While that's a daunting task to do, I'm feeling confident that not everybody will respond to the message I will send them (which I'll mention in a moment). Instead of having, say, 100 ongoing conversations, I might only have to deal with 70. 70 is still a high number, but at least it's not 100. As for the message, I plan on sending, I'm thinking something along the lines of this (keep in mind that this is only a draft question, and may be changed sometime in the future):

Hello. It's embarrassing for me to admit this to you, but the truth is, I don't know you at all, other than your name. I don't know who you are, where you come from, and where you belong in this mad, blue world (and if I do know who you are, and you got this...sorry that I forgot?). However, I do want to know you: what makes you happy, your favorite art and its myriad forms, your regrets, your dreams, the last time you cried, something you hope you'll never be, what keeps you awake at night. At the very least, describe yourself in one word. I'm not asking you to reveal your authentic, personal self all at once, but I am asking that you'll slowly (even if you're hesitant - and that's ok: I'd be hesitant myself!) reveal yourself to me. For the sake of equivalent exchange, I'll share something about myself also, giving you something in return for what you have given me. The hope is that someday, in the distant future, we can become friends (even if this is just upon this digital landscape), rather than remain a subconscious, subtle blip in our lives. I trust that you'll read this lengthy message and take the chance to meet somebody new, or at least, somebody who subtly lingered about your news feed and friends list for some time.

I hope that at least one person bravely responds back to me...

My Chain of Memories

Thanks to being sick these two weeks, I've been using my free time being bed-ridden to catch up on my gaming, especially considering I'm at the mercy of of my demands and expectations to both work and school. As the title of this blog post suggests, I've been frantically playing Kingdom Hearts: Re:Chain of Memories, trying to complete the game before all my free time is all used up. That and trying to squeeze in all  the Kingdom Hearts games (yes, even Re:Coded) before the highly-anticipated Kingdom Hearts III is finally released (and I mean finally!). 

While Chain of Memories is an interquel, bridging Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II together, CoM also explores key motifs and themes revolving around memories and how those memories "chain" people together, establishing relationships not so easily broken, or separate two people indefinitely. By the end of the game, Sora had, essentially, lost all of his memories of the people he met, the places he visited, and adventures he shared with Donald, Goofy, and the myriad companions met along the way. The only memories retained at the top of Castle Oblivion were the critical memories that had motivated Sora to protect The One Most Dearest To Him, as well as not to forget the bond of friendship that tie Sora, Donald, and Goofy together.

In this context of the game, I often found myself reflecting about the people I know, the people I'm connected to, and the people most important to me. I know that I have people that are just like Goofy and Donald: they won't forget me, no matter how much time and distance separate us. I think of these people constantly, and I'm confident that they think of me, too. These people, I'm not too worried about, because we've been through too much to forget it all, even if now, the tiny details of our time together are either warped or marred indefinitely.

It's the people that I've met over the course of my life that this really strikes hard in my heart. I've made friends, shared moments, and had an adventure or two with the people I've met throughout my life. However, I constantly wonder: Do they remember me? Us? I still do, but...do they? I guess this all can be reduced down to the surprising revelation of the number of people that are deeply connected to Sora, and this revelation made me question the number of people that are connected to me, also. I know there are people, as mentioned earlier, that, without a shadow of a doubt, I am connected to; but on the other side of the coin, I also know that there are others where the connection may or may not exist at all. This makes me feel uneasy about myself sometimes.

Perhaps, this is just the rambling of  a self-conscious of Little Big Man who worries he may not have too many friends in his life. Who knows really? This could be a personal reminder to seek out those who matter to him most to reconnect, share, and live life together.