Disconnected Friends

This weekend I had a most peculiar experience. I ran into two people that I know and don't know at the same time. We found ourselves involved in each others' lives years ago but were never really friends. Like the type of relationship you have with your barista at your local coffee shop. You're friendly (hopefully) and can keep up a conversation and maybe just maybe even keep up on things in each others' lives from previous conversations. But you never really become friends. That is how it was for me and Sam and Rob.
As it turned out, John was able to come over Friday night so we could see each other. Which I was very stoked about. I drove up to Port Townsend to pick him up and then we decided to go to dinner back in Poulsbo at Tizley's. If you ever find yourself in Poulsbo, make it a point to go to Tizley's for one meal. It is a great place with a extremely friendly atmosphere and I always feel like everyone there has an overall warm happy feeling radiating from them. It's very comfortable. It was crowded Friday night so we hungout by the busy bar as we waited for our table. At one point a bar stool open up so I headed over to claim it. The guy sitting to the right of it apologized for taking up so much room. I told him not to worry about it and then looked at him and realized he was a former customer from when I worked at the bank! Without meaning to I said "Hey I know you!" and then I had to follow that with "Well not really but I sort of do..." He found this rather funny, introduced himself, and the four of us (me, John, Sam, and his friend Rudy) talked the paper off the walls until a waitress let us know our table was ready. We found ourselves extremely hesitant to take it and finally we agreed that Sam and Rudy should join us at our table if for nothing else than continuing our conversation. John and Sam are both history majors so they have no problem telling long, involved, detailed and correctly quoted stories. I can't honestly say I can remember a more enjoyable evening with strangers. But I guess they weren't entirely strangers. It's like we all became friends within the first 5 minutes of talking. I dig that.
My second experience with this phenomenon was on Saturday. John went home Saturday morning and I headed over to Seattle to see my cousin Steph. As soon as I arrived, we agreed to go get food because we were both starving. We went to Red Mill Burgers (so good) where she works and while we waited for our food we snuck next door to Starbucks. This is where former-acquaintance #2 occurred. Our barista was a young guy with dark brown eyes that just looked SO familiar. I knew I had interacted with him more than just passing on the street. But where and when I could NOT put my finger on. When he had my coffee, I asked him if he had ever worked at a Starbucks in Kitsap County. He said "No...but you look very familiar!" We looked quizzically at each other for a minute and he broke the silence with "I went to SPU..." THAT was our connection! After further discussion we figured out we were in the same art class freshman year. It was a nice reintroduction and nice laughing about our professor and our experiences at that school. His name was Rob. Both experiences with meeting up with disconnected friends (Sam and Rob) made me happy. But kinda sad too. It's a confusing situation. You sit there and think...should I ask for their number so we can be REAL friends? But we're moving away...is it even worth it? Is it even appropriate?
Hopefully...I'll have odd friend experiences in North Carolina too. I hope I will make friends quickly.