A couple years ago, in a museum display, I saw an old college friend of mine in a photo. I hadn’t thought of him in years but he was one of my best friends in college, he came to my wedding, but we kept in touch very minimally afer that. I looked him up on FB and sent him a message telling him about the photo. Never heard anything back. Forgot about it. Then last year, 2 or 3 years later, he writes back saying he just saw my message and was so glad to get in touch, wanted to catch up by phone, agreed to call me at a certain time. He didn’t call and rescheduled. Then made another appointment and something came up with him again. I said to call any time since my schedule is more flexible. He never called. I sent him one more message asking if I could call him, which he never answered. I started to notice a lot of strange things on his FB that indicated mental health issues (oversharing, talking about his medications, raving about politics, very emotional, odd stuff I don’t want to get into, etc.) I know that his mom was mentally ill and had abandoned her H and 3 kids when my friend was very young. I never post anything but a Christmas photo on FB/nothing political. He really went nuts after the election and asked me to unfriend him. Which I did instantly. (Maybe he looked at my FB friends??–mixed but mostly conservative/ family oriented/ Catholic.) Strange/sad experience. Just want to forget about it and remember how he was in the old days.
Because of nostalgia and this thread, reached out to several old friends from bygone decades. Will see whether they end up touching base with me or not.
A couple of years ago I got a Facebook friend request from someone I didn’t recognize and whose name was unfamiliar. I almost deleted it but decided to reply and ask her how she knew me. Turns out it was my freshman college roommate! She had a different last name, short white hair (used to be long brown hair) and even her face looked different. I had been searching for her for years myself without any luck so I was excited that she found me! We’re hoping to get together next month when I have a mini-reunion with my other college buds.
The cool thing about LinkedIn is that it would recommend connections based on your current connections and schools attended… I found a couple of classmates that way - they got married and changed their last names… they look so different but their profiles (publications, postdoc, etc.) left no doubt as to who they are. 
I mentioned before that I had found my old college boyfriend. At least I know where he lives. I have not seen him since the end of 1979. He is not on FB, but his wife is. She doesn’t post much, but there are a few photos of the family. He is old and fat. I am, too, but those old friends are supposed to stay just the way they were way back then! I have no desire to see him. That’s water under the bridge, but I do reminisce about the fun time of life that he was a part of.
A HS classmate started a class FB page about 4 years ago and through it I have connected with several old friends. As time has passed and we have sadly lost several people, my classmates have made an effort to get together on a regular basis. I haven’t been able to join them thus far (I live 700 miles away), but plan to.
I purposely included my (unusual Northern Italian) maiden name on FB. It has made it easier for HS and college classmates as well as other people who I grew up with to find me. They are also more likely to accept my own friend requests as they can place me.
I’m not on FB or Linked In, but occasionally I sit with H and look through his. Once, a name came up as a potential contact for him, apparently because we live in the same town. The woman had a common first name and I didn’t recognize the last name, but she looked vaguely familiar. In reading her posts, I realized that we had gone to elementary school together, in a different place. I had to practically threaten to break H’s computer to make him cease from trying to contact her. He has friends from birth and can’t understand that I have no interest in going back to times past. I could see from her posts that she was friends with the crowd of women in my town with whom I am not friends and I really didn’t want to reconnect. Ever since then, I have never admitted to recognizing a single person on H’s FB that he doesn’t already know that I know. I have a vague curiosity about a couple of people that I used to be friendly with, but not enough to look them up.
@techmom99: Why didn’t you want your DH to contact this woman?
Because I don’t wish to resume a relationship with her, that’s why. I can see from her posts that our values are not the same, our friend groups in town are not the same or we might have encountered each other the old fashioned way, our children are not friends and I don’t have any interest in rekindling a 50 years ago elementary school friendship. Is that enough of a reason? H would have no reason to know this woman at all but for my comment. Had I not said anything, he would have just skipped by the “people you might know” thing on FB.
I also look through H’s Facebook from time to time.
I did a search for an old friend and found her eventually.
After friending her through H I realized that her politics and her values
are very difficult for me to see.
So I never responded again but am really glad to know where she is, that while she had
a severe stroke decades ago, she is loved by her family and well taken care of
An old girlfriend found DH via facebook. Fortunately, she barely remembered dating him,just thought he was part of a circle of friends.
Of course. I wasn’t trying to challenge you; I was simply asking for information.
Well I am FB friends with the wife of one of my former boyfriends
Back story: They met when he was dating me. She was a close fried of mine and they always kind of liked each other and started dating very soon after we broke up. The breakup was mutual, he is a great guy but it wasn’t going to work out with him and me. Flash forward - they have been happily married for over 35 years and I’m glad it worked out. They are two really nice people.
I apologize for my tone being a little snarky, which I noticed when I read my response over after seeing your answer. I just chose not to engage this particular person for the reasons I set forth and I don’t have any interest in being on FB at all. OTOH, l am friends with several of my H’s exes, though not on FB. I am NOT friends with any of my own exes.
Years ago, I was working in a corporate legal department, and got curious about an ex-bf from college. He was a year younger than me, but planned to go to law school after graduating. I used Martindale-Hubbell to look him up, and discovered he was an attorney with a firm in NYC, located in the World Trade Center. I sent him an email (happily married, just wanted to say “hi”) and he sent a nice, newsy reply. He was also married, and had two children a year younger than each of my children. This was way before Facebook, and email was in its infancy.
When 9/11 happened, I looked him up again, and he was with the same firm, in the World Trade Center. I did an internet search, and I was able to find a first-person account he wrote about being in NYC that day. He had voted that morning so went into work later than usual, so was not in the building or his office when the planes hit.
We are FB friends now (have lots of university friends in common) and we met for lunch when I was in NYC about a year and a half ago.
Partly thanks to this thread, just reconnected with my ex from college. We were great friends and did see one another once when I threw a birthday party for H in LA (he and his wife live in LA). I sent him an email yesterday and he responded less than 24 hours later. We may meet when we are next in LA visiting D, perhaps. Otherwise, I was happy just to update him in our lives and be update in his and his wife’s.
I also sent out a few more notes to others I knew in college and law school. I will see whether I hear back as I did have some great friends back then.
You can’t make any more old friends. It’s good to keep the ones you have.
H and I are friendly with his exes from his single days tho our paths don’t cross often. Neither of us are jealous of prior relationships and are very open at including our spouses as they are interested.
My old girlfriend was a professor in New Orleans when Katrina hit. I sent her an e-mail to let her know I was thinking about her (first contact since we’d broken up) but she never responded. She’s now a professor at another university. I’ve often considered sending another e-mail but I don’t think I ever will. She’s married now (to the guy she dumped me for) and it might be weird.
Now this might sound too stalker-ish, but I discovered that the free part of the Intelius website generally finds people under their maiden names. It lists possible relatives, and this way you can see what the new last name might be. I used this to try to find my sophomore year roommate, who transferred schools after that, and I lost track of her. But no luck.
I actually haven’t followed up on the few people I looked for and found, but when my best friend from down the street till I was 9 and then moved away sent a LinkedIn request all the way from Alaska, I was really glad to hear from her. I’ve also been happy to accept friend requests on Facebook with people from high school who sometimes remember me more than I remember them. I’ve also reconnected in person with some of them, people I never thought I’d see again.
As for exes, yes, I’ve Googled them, but leave them in the past where I think they belong.