How do you stay in contact with friends and family? [Archive]

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Tradd

2-3-20, 1:12pm

I thought this would be interesting.

Snail mail
Email
Phone calls
Texts
FaceTime
Facebook Messenger
WhatsApp
Other

I use a mix of electronic methods, and even do cards and letters often.

Teacher Terry

2-3-20, 1:14pm

I use all except snail mail.

razz

2-3-20, 1:21pm

All including actual face to face visits except:

FaceTime - very occasionally
Facebook Messenger - never
WhatsApp- I have this but rarely use it

Yppej

2-3-20, 1:36pm

Meet in person
Text
Instant messenger (Spark)
Email
Phone calls
Cards and gifts sometimes via snail mail

Tradd

2-3-20, 1:48pm

I use WhatsApp with a friend in Canada who is not on any social media. While my unlimited Verizon plan covers calls and texts to Canada, friend has to pay per text to the US. WhatsApp is fine.

catherine

2-3-20, 2:11pm

All but snail mail and WhatsApp.

Friends: I keep in touch on Facebook and Messenger, sometimes text.
Family: Text mostly, then phone, and I go to some lengths to see them in person. I try to make a trip to CT once a year to see aunts and cousins. This year is my first year renting a house for face-time with my grandkids. I like it... we've seen them 4 times already and had great fun. Yesterday I met them at a park, and my 2 1-2 year old grandson who barely knew me when we left for Grand Isle last summer went running when he saw me across the park into my arms. Sometimes there is NO substitute for in-person visits.

I don't like calling friends or family on the phone unless we've arranged it in advance. I feel like it's an invasion of sorts.

Teacher Terry

2-3-20, 2:25pm

I never heard of what’s ap until my kids told me that would be the only way we could stay in contact when they were in Asia. Seeing someone in person is the best of course. Catherine, we bought the house next door to my parents and they were very close to my kids.

Gardnr

2-3-20, 2:59pm

Text
Email
FaceBook

rare snail mail
Occasional phone call to some

Every 5y we have a big reunion-this year 39 people. I am super excited!

sweetana3

2-3-20, 5:42pm

We live in IN, FL and Alaska. Only use Facebook. I see them every 5 years or so.

rosarugosa

2-3-20, 7:26pm

Snail mail - letters with a couple of people, cards more frequently
Email
Phone calls
Texts
Facebook Messenger

mamalatte

2-4-20, 12:11am

almost entirely email
occasional phone calls
text and in-person meetings with friends who are neighbors

Simplemind

2-4-20, 1:13am

Snail mail cards for special occasions and holidays
Phone (not my fave )
Text (not my fave)
email
FB for extended family
In person (fave)

ToomuchStuff

2-4-20, 4:23am

In a lot of ways, I don't. I don't do social media. Several friends have moved away and the only method of contact is through that, since don't have addresses.
The ones I do, is mostly physical visits. Some phone calls, but those are more intrusive. Rare email. Then you have the issue where I am at one end of the spectrum and so many friends are at another when it comes to income/time/family, etc.

Chicken lady

2-4-20, 6:20am

I lost most of my friends when they moved to Facebook. You find out who your friends are....

Mostly phone and email. T doesn’t do email and she knows I probably won’t answer the phone if I’m home (outside) so she just comes to my house.

also snail mail -mostly my mom, dh aunt, Christmas letters (received, not sent)
and facetime for immediate family - mom, kids.

Tradd

2-4-20, 10:19am

What I do with phone calls is that I’ll text the friend and see if they’re available to talk. I’ve got friends all over the country in different time zones with different work schedules, so this works the best.

Tradd

2-4-20, 10:20am

I should have stipulated in original post that this was for people you don’t see often.

Chicken lady

2-4-20, 10:31am

Define often?

Tradd

2-4-20, 10:32am

Probably non-local

happystuff

2-4-20, 12:13pm

emails
phone calls
texting

Tybee

2-4-20, 1:08pm

Phone and letters, primarily. Email next, texts only to my children.

Chicken lady

2-4-20, 6:54pm

One non-local friend send me a Christmas card every year.

one emails me every six months or so. One emails me less often.

one stays in touch with my parents who keep us both updated on each other. She calls every 5 or 6 years when I am at my parents’ house.

those are all my non local friends who did not disappear completely into Facebook.

Rogar

2-5-20, 9:14pm

Email has been a boon for me to keep in touch. It's mostly replaced all phone or letters from the analog days. Messaging only occasionally when the message is short, but not a real way to catch up with news and events of friends and family. Since retiring I've had more face to face non-work real person contact and I don't think any other convenience has replaced that. I don't like face book. The few times I've been encouraged to join, I've said I'd like to stay in touch with emails or meeting over coffee.

pcooley

2-21-20, 11:34am

Our daughter is in college now, and we send a lot of postcards back and forth. Every two or three weeks, we call and talk. Occasionally, I'll write a longer letter, but I haven't had as much time lately. If there's just something that needs taking care of, we use email, although that is sometimes initiated with a phone call. Luckily, her cell phone is still a local number for us, so we don't run up our long distance bill. Occasionally, we try to have some sort of video chat with her, but that never seems to work. FaceTime on our Macbook stopped working about ten years ago, and I haven't been able to figure out why. Video chatting always feels awkward anyway.

Edited to add: I don't really keep in touch with my brother and sisters much. I write my brother once or twice a year, but I never hear back. We talk on the phone every two or three years, but we never have a lot to say. My father and his brother were like that, so it might just be a family trait. I get along well with one of my two sisters, and we exchange two or three letters a year, and talk on the phone about as often. She got rid of her land line, though, and I've always found I don't like calling people on their cell phone - I never know where they are, and I'm always thrown when they pick up and they're driving, or at the grandkids' football game, etc. So we don't talk as much as we used to, but she is my main source of family news.

(I did get rid of my landline at one time, when everyone was doing that, but I found I felt somewhat bereft without it, and we had it put back. )