I got a nice note today from a friend who lives elsewhere asking how I was, and that I seemed a little down lately in my facebook posts. That note alone picked up my spirits. that gesture made the difference in my day. It always surprises me in both good and bad ways what one little sentence, what tiny little thought can do to a whole mindset.
I've kind of had several friendships implode lately. One I blogged about before. There have been a couple other cases - one was a deliberate built-up resentment that got thrown at me and my partner for something that we didn't even know bothered him - tardiness. Apparently it bothered him a lot. enough to not only respond to some inquiries we made about missing a bday dinner we didn't know about, to be informed we were deliberately not invited because he didn't want to have things ruined by us being late and making a big deal of it when we got there... ??? So we were not invited due to tardiness... Really? A note saying "please be on time" wouldn't work? Or since I feel I owed this friend for hosting an event for me, asking us to help set up would have been perfectly in line, and avoided the whole issue. The sad thing, as I see it, is there were plenty of opportunities to tell us he was bothered way before it build up into a shit brick he decided to throw at us. He has every right to invite whomever he wants to whatever he wants and is under no obligation to include me or my partner in anything....It just could have been handled differently. but to me it seems like the friendship got thrown out the window and hit us in the face.
Another friend has just drifted, which happens. People grow in different directions. I'm okay with that. It doesn't make the loss hurt less, just more understandable.
My life has always involved change. I went to a private nursery school, then public kindergarten, then Catholic 1st grade, then public 2-5th grade where i forged more permanent friendshilps. That changes when my 6th grade was a merger of my school and 2 other elementary schools ( a function of the Lower Makefield Township school system). We then moved after 6th grade from Pennsylvania to New York and I went to another school for 7th and 8th grades. I was bullied and harassed there, and begged to go to yet another school, to which I went to a Catholic high school where everyone was new, and I finally found my group for 4 years. After graduation I went to college in upstate NY for 3 years, ended up falling in love and moving to Dallas, where I went to college another 4 years.
The reason I listed all that is to show that my whole upbringing was change, transition and moving from group to group of friends. After that I had my lovely 12 year hellhole (blog post 1) where all bets were off. After that ended and life started over, I've been searching for consistency and stability. But that still seems to elude me. For whatever reason, transition happens every few years with my friendships. We drift apart, we have a falling out, whatever... I can't help but think that this is just a continuation of a pattern that I may or may not be influencing.
I don't know. I've thought and thought about it but have no answers. All I know is that I wish I had an old friend who had been in my life for a long time. Facebook has helped re-kindle some relationships with those people I used to be around in other situations. Mostly it's done nothing, but there are a couple examples where I stay in touch and have let a new friendship start to grow. Still, I want someone who knows me from before, from earlier. who remembers things about me, not because I told them about it, but because they were there. I don't have that.
When efforts to build something toward a longer term friendship fall apart, or gradually drift apart, it gives me that feeling in my stomach where you just found out you were fired, or some relative died. It's not good and I don't like it. I try to look at it as God weeding out the people that don't belong in my life to make room for people that want in.
It still fucking sucks.
Thank God I have Peter. My love. the man that shows me how strong and beautiful I can be. the man that treats me like the greatest prize he's ever had (usually ;-) ) and hopefully I do the same for him. He fills the void of best friend that I had. He's the best thing in my life, and I love him more than I thought I could ever love again. and for that I am grateful.
