Friending What Neighbours I Find

Started adding neighbours today after one of them friended me. Without asking, it is hard to know who might be on Facebook. Except for the writers and artists, who have work, books and readings to promote, most individuals have around 10 to 50 friends, nearly all relatives or someone they knew in highschool.
Went to add a shy neighbour only to discover there were 153 with the same name. 30 of these had put no profile picture. Figuring one of these had to be her, I randomly clicked on these white head-and-shoulers outlines and asked if they knew me. Then she said, later that day, that her daughter had forced her to put up a profile picture. So now I need to go back and sort out which of the ambiguous, very small and group pictures contains her. Or spend a lot more time chatting with her to pry a description out.
Most women my age simply don’t have time for online anything. We run from one volunteer commitment to exercise class to coffee with someone we haven’t seen in awhile, to the library to get yet another recommended book, grocery shopping, credit union, taxes, paperwork, walk the dog, all the accroutments of the busy life and then some young thing yawns and asks what on earth we could ever find to DO all day. Or you try to explain your days to a friend who is retiring.
When you’ve got stuff to chase already, left over from your busy life prior to retirment (in my case it was bookselling), then you’re full to the brim with deadlines and do-lists. Most retired friends tell me they can’t see how they ever found the time to go to work. But it’s a great time in your life, not selling your time to anyone, doing things that you really want to do, choose to do, not forced to do for money. Yesterday at the pool we were singing Irish songs in the sauna, most of us retired, all of us in bathing suits with big grins from the memories that came from the time we first heard this song or that one.
Everyone knew Tura lura lura, that old lullaby.
I do still work part-time, eight hours a week, which is plenty. Today I’m wearing the purple dress with the rabbits in honour of Easter, looking forward to kids coming in on March Break and being read some of the 200 year old rhymes and songs from The Rooster Crows, one of the parts of my work I really love.