I had a friend I used to backpack with in the 1990s. I moved away later and lost track of him. In 2011 I decided to contact him and see how he was doing. He was no longer living at his previous address so I did a google search and found a notice of his death two years earlier. Now I'm hesitant to look up old friends and instead choose to remember them and the good times we had together. That way they'll live forever.