Time.
As it rolls on it carries many things in its wake. Memories fade, pain eases, hope passes away. Relationships strengthen as time continues its eternal press forward, or they flounder and are lost. And in its constant, relentless advance we may gain some knowledge and understanding.
With that understanding comes new insight. In my life (both on and offline) I have met some very interesting people. It is fascinating for me to see how time has changed my perception of those people. With anything, the effects of time cut both ways.
There are quite a few people who, based on first impressions, I found to be detestable. Yet time proved me to be wrong, and as I learned more about them and understood them better closeness formed. I have some good friends in both real life and net life who only became my friends after the passage of time.
Sadly, it has worked in reverse as well.
The persistence of time, in its inexorable press forward has also brought understanding that I perhaps wish it hadn't. Those I once thought I had a bond with, that I understood, have in some cases become as foreign to me as can be imagined. And so relationships that flourished now flounder and I am left wondering who was doing the hiding, me or them.
It can be painful to realize that a friend is now only an acquaintance. And as lamentable as it may seem I don't think there is any way around it. Our energies can only be expended in so many directions, and our time split between only so many areas. The friendships we actively cultivate need to be the ones that are most important to us. That doesn't mean we turn on others. We still remain friends in a more loose sense of the word. But perhaps, if suddenly we find we don't see or hear from someone as often as we used to we should look in ourselves as well, to see how we have changed.