An old friend finds me on the Internet

I got an email a couple of weeks ago that had the subject “I remember you from the Marine Military Academy.”  That in itself isn’t very surprising, as I’m pretty involved with the school and I have a page about the school here on my Web site.  If you search Google for “Marine Military Academy” or “Jim Mischel,” you’re going to find my site.  I regularly get email from guys I knew at the school.

I also get mail periodically from parents I’ve met during my visits or who are considering enrolling their sons at the school and want to talk to somebody who attended.  I’m happy to help out in any way I can.  As I’ve said numerous times before, I strongly believe in the school’s goals and methods.

But this email was different.  It was from a woman (she was a girl then, about two years younger than I) who I dated when I went to school there.  I was totally floored.  Of course I remembered her, once I read her maiden name.  It’s not like I dated or even knew many girls in Harlingen.  She said that she’d visited Classmates.com, saw my name there, and thought she’d search Google to see if she could find me.  I’m flattered that she remembered my name, and very happy that she sent me email.

If you’re at all interested in getting in touch with people you went to school with, you should at least sign up for the free part of Classmates.com and other such services.  They won’t publish your email address, but if you have any kind of Web presence at all then people who see your name and remember you will have some chance of getting in touch.

The Internet really is a wonderful tool for finding people.  All the interconnections make serendipitous discoveries like this far more possible and likely than they would be otherwise.