Click. The friend request box is blinking with a new request. Upon clicking the viewing page, the teen views the profile, asking “Who in the world is this?” After a second, realization hits. It’s an old friend.

With many people moving around, it’s hard to stay connected. With the invention of the internet and especially Facebook, keeping in touch is much easier.

Even students here can tell you a story about a long lost best friend they found on Facebook.

“I found my best friend in Pratt from first grade on Facebook,” junior MacKenzie Albers said. “Now I talk to her all the time.”

Teens even use Facebook to connect with distant relatives, such as cousins in different states.

“I was curious to see if my cousin had a Facebook because I hadn’t talked to her in a while and now we talk occasionally,” junior Brady Baumgarn said.

They even connect with grandparents.

“I met my dad’s dad on Facebook,” junior Torrey Contrerez said. “It was about halfway through last year. It was the first time I had ever talked to him.”

Some people, though, have had even more extreme connections on Facebook. According to reports, in southern California a woman found her kidnapped daughter 15 years later on Facebook.

Her son and daughter were kidnapped in 1995 by her ex-husband after he violated his custody agreement. The children were only toddlers at the time, ages 2 and 3. She had been looking everywhere for her kidnapped children and finally turned to Facebook.

She typed in her daughter’s name and came up with her page. After contacting her daughter, the daughter sent back a reply saying she wanted no contact with her mother and that they were having a happy life without her. The mother contacted police and they tracked her daughter to Florida. The ex-husband was arrested and the teens, now 17 and 16, live with their mom.

Teens meet many new people from many different places. Facebook has made keeping in touch that much easier. Before Facebook it was difficult to keep in touch with childhood friends. Now with everyone on Facebook it’s easy to keep connected with those random people teens meet all the time.