Twitter: Relationships in Book Five: Working Through the Maze 2018

Yeah, a third one. Fight me.
This one will be quick. Twitter length… well… Twitter Length for me.
Friendships are interesting and provide curious traps. I have some dear friends I haven’t seen in YEARS. I want to write them a letter to apologize and tell them I still love them and hope we’re still friends. But I worry that such a thing would seem… odd. Of course I’ll still do it! I never fear to err on the side of strange to people I know IRL. People I know IRL have usually seen me in bizarre or precarious positions and know that “odd” is just par for the course.

The NON IRL is where I get really befuddled. With PB’s close call, my penchant for Video Games, and other influencers… I’ve made several more On-Line Only friends. In these instances… the rules of etiquette, good manners, and polite conversation completely elude me.

Am I required to have conversations with my on-line friends periodically to make sure they know I care; or is a healthy Facebook like/share relationship enough?
If I never interact with someone on-line, but they provide a steady stream of likes/comments on my social media… am I being a bad “friend” for not reciprocating, or is this just the nature of that particular beast?
And then we get into bigger elements!
If I’m having an on-line conversation with someone and they don’t respond for 24 hours, do I wait for them to send me a message or is it okay to send a follow up message? Does that seem needy or annoying? How many times of “no response” should I allow before I consider the conversation and/or friendship terminated? If it seems that the friend is annoyed or upset with me… does one allow for a cooling off period and then send a note, or simply allow the other person to get back in touch?

I guess the above could be summarized as:
IRL, the people that know me realize I can be an awkward, odd little duck and I have no apprehensions contacting them. Or at least no apprehensions that actually change how I contact them.
On-Line, the people that know me may have no idea that I can be an awkward, odd little duck and my apprehensions about communicating there can and do interfere with my ability to communicate.