The 'just send a friend request' advice is ruining chances to reconnect

I tried that on an old friend from high school in Austin last month and got ignored, but when I found their old email and wrote 3 sentences about that one time we crashed their mom's minivan, they responded in 6 hours.

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2 Comments

the_charlie3mo ago

Made myself look desperate enough to crash a minivan.

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ryanf663mo ago

the "crashed their mom's minivan" part is key though. that's the whole thing right there. you gotta give them a specific memory they can latch onto, not just "hey remember me." a random friend request with no context is basically spam to most adults now. but a quick email or text with one weird shared moment shows you actually remember them as a person, not just a name from a list. minivan crash is perfect because its weird and specific and makes them laugh. that's way better than trying to get back in through a generic social media ping.

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