Realtime Facetime - The Original Social Network?

Having recently spent a wonderful two weeks with my best friend who was visiting from Australia, I was asked last week at a wedding what we had got up to during our time together – as I re-called the fantastic experiences we’d had including watching Henry V at the Globe, a trip to Rome and a great meal at my favourite Heston pub in Bray, I realised that we’d also spent an in-ordinate amount of time drinking coffee.

I think one of the reasons for this is I miss our face time - normal communication is email, social networking and Skype (once I've managed to calculate the correct time difference!) In this age of the internet and all things digital it's so easy to have an evening with our on-line community of friends from the comfort of the sofa.  Case in point being Friday night watching the amazing Opening Ceremony of the Olympics - I spent half the night watching the TV and the other tweeting my views and emotions.

You can chat on Facebook, 'like' what everyone else has been up to, tweet away the hours and create your perfect fashion 'wish list' on Pinterest.  We have more communication options available to us and yet more of the population admit to feeling lonely than ever before.

I'm as guilty as anyone of this and with our busy lives - juggling work, home, social commitments, family and commuting - it is so much easier to take a quick look on-line at what our friends have been up to than to pick up the phone or make the time to meet up. I admit to being one of the 70% who suffer a level of anxiety when parted from my phone.  I love fact that I can so easily make all my arrangements on-line at my convenience.

As great as all this technology is do we run the risk of forgetting the importance of sitting down with a friend face to face?  I'm not talking about alcohol fuelled nights out or dinner that take up a whole evening, just a good quality catch up where we can offload, laugh and realise that everyone's is juggling responsibilities and life isn't perfect for anyone!  Our Facebook profiles gloss over the nitty gritty and mundane parts of everyday life - according to our on-line lives everything is perfect and we are all super busy having a great time!

Finding a great Coffee shop and sitting down in a quiet environment without the interruption of a mobile or the distraction of a laptop can be fulfilling, a chance to jump off the hamster wheel, - to fully focus your attention on a friend and the conversation in hand.  You can see the emotion on their face - is everything really going well or do they need a confidante or a shoulder to cry, does that smile mean they have exciting news to share?  

We can slot it into our day between work, running errands.....grab a coffee before work, whilst out shopping or drop into a friend's house on the way home with take out cappuccino!

So in this time where everyone seems to be coming together as a nation to support Team GB in their quest for gold - pick up the phone (or send a message via Facebook or text!) and arrange to meet a friend, it only needs to be 30 minutes, and I bet it really makes their day......