lost connections
There are past internet contacts that I still occasionally check up on. Like every year or two, I will randomly think of them and their username(s), and see what I can find, without still having any socials or following them anywhere.
One of them is a person I used to be mutuals with on Tumblr way, way back. For years, we used to message, comment on each other’s posts and reblog, and she gave me courage and support when I broke up with someone. I watched her really build up her career and her own horse business, and it was amazing seeing her grow and change. But we lost touch at some point.
Finding her over the years to see how she was doing was easy: She was so successful in her niche, well known, with official work-dedicated social media profiles and her own website that showed off her and her credentials, her approach in her business, and more. It used to be easy to find her main blog and her sideblog for her dog, too. I never reached out directly, it was just enough to know everything is well and remembering the old times.
But when I checked this time, it was a lot harder, despite having both the usernames and her real name. It seems like 90% of it vanished; some articles about her remained, but nothing of herself. The Facebook page has a note from January 2025, saying she is not using it anymore and moving away from Meta (good!). Her Tumblr is now password-protected and her dog blog seems to be deleted (or maybe I just can’t find it). The website for her business is now completely matter-of-fact, impersonal, not mentioning her name, not showing her on pictures at all. It’s a lot colder than it used to be, no longer having this loving and personal language about horse wellness and working with kids. It lacks a lot of the scenic, romantic pictures and the entire backstory of how it came to be. The URL has changed, too, but it’s clearly still her horses being shown.
At first I wondered if she had died, but I couldn’t find anything about that. I don’t think she sold the business, either, as she lives there and these are her animals. So I had to conclude that it was all intentional, that her time of being very present online and sharing herself openly and publicly were over.
It made me wonder if her priorities simply naturally shifted after becoming a mum 3 years ago, or if something bad happened. I wonder if it had to do with the increasingly bad climate online on the platforms she frequented, or maybe even the political climate in the US. She had always been very leftist, outspoken feminist, pro abortion and more, and it’s only becoming more and more apparent now that that simply may not be something you can openly say in the US without maybe being punished for it one way or another.
It made me a little sad. I can’t blame her, I did the same thing ages ago, starting 2018. But it really rubbed in that this era is over, our connection is severed, and that I now lose access to finding out what will happen to her, just like everyone else whose usernames I forgot or who just never logged back in anymore without an explanation or a link to other means of contact.
I remember in the first few years of Facebook, it seemed like we would just be able to keep track of people for most likely a good chunk of our lives now, maybe even the rest of our life. No more wondering what someone from that forum or high school might be up to, or only having random run-ins at the grocery store to know about how someone’s doing.
But looking at it now, so many people have deleted their Facebook account, no longer log in, or just lurk without posting anything. Same with other platforms. Sad how it all shifted, and how the internet doesn’t lend itself well to (re)connection and care in this way anymore (or maybe, just in specific corners that many do not frequent).
Reply via email
Published 19 Sep, 2025