Weighing on my heart

During a trip late last summer to my favorite town resulted in a loss of a friendship of many years standing. I've been on a journey of intense self discovery since, rethinking my own personal definition of friendship and what value it holds in my life. Asking myself if I am the toxic friend, the friendenemy. My attempts to repair this friendship have fallen upon deaf ears. Chances are it's truly over. I never once thought this was all her fault, this misunderstanding. But it's not all my fault either although I willing took the responsibility of apology upon my own shoulders. I'm not convinced I handled it in the proper format but I tried. I tried as much as I'm capable of trying. Let me explain this. It's hard to put yourself out there when you fear failure or rejection. No one enjoys having their feelings hurt or stomped on. While my apologies and attempts were genuine and sincere I did not give in to her demands of a post mortem rehashing of said events. I felt it would not serve either of us well. So instead I apologized, I apologized with contrition, I apologized with love and remembrance of years of friendship and finally I apologized the last time with an economy of words and simplicity, the final plea of can't we just be friends again? Only this weekend I asked her will we ever speak again? and yet she is unmoved.


I somehow thought once we got through the apology stage then we could move on to the why did this happen stage and we both could then acknowledge our own parts in it , we'd somehow be friends again. I thought by offering my apologizes and an willingness to accept the majority of the blame that it would create an safe haven of forgiveness where our friendship could survive while we worked thru our differences. I was wrong. This is not what happened. My apologies have been rejected. It seems I'm not worth having for a friend after all these years.





This hurts. Have you ever been the last one chosen for a team? Have you ever been rejected and found lacking? Have you ever looked around and thought is it me?





I can tell you it's much easier to lose new friends, easier on your heart than to lose an old friend. While new friendships can be destroyed easier than old ones, when the old ones are lost they cut deeper and leave a bigger hole in your heart. The new ones don't have such a hold on your heart like the old ones do. It's much easier to let the new friends go, to move on, to say it's not me, it's them... but the old ones? Oh let me tell you, it's hard to hide from the truth.



So after yet another rejection of my attempts to open a dialogue between us I've about come to the conclusion that my wise friend Miss Barbara was right in her advice, all that I can really do at this juncture is to pray for her.

I wrote this post a year ago in December of 2008. Since that time the friendship has not resumed, we have not patched things up, spoken, anything. I did happen upon a semi-hidden blog post she wrote within days of the falling out, me and all my faults were the topic and she goes so far as to say that she had been building me up falsely, feeding my ego and how she created this monster that I had become.

Wow that's pretty toxic... You can imagine how you would feel to have someone you considered a dear friend write such things about you... on a blog no less! to know that they were systematically set upon a course of feeding you a line of bull -- for what purpose I have to wonder? I was sick to my stomach when I read that blog post of hers. Then I realized that I didn't recognize this person she was speaking of... these horrible things were not me, although she wrote it about me MY SPIRIT REJECTS IT!!!

Well I'm back to the sage advice of my friend Miss Barbara, wise woman that she is... pray, pray, pray... so I have been praying for her, she deserves nothing less than happiness in her life and if that means sans friendship with me then so be it. At some point in the future should our paths somehow cross I love the memory of the friendship I thought we were sharing enough to speak warmly and embrace her. I wish her well and pray for her often. It's my misfortune that I apparently cared more for her than she for me.... and that's okay. It has to be, after all what choice do I have in the matter? And why would I want to seek a relationship with someone who clearly found she much preferred to play games with me by lying to me?

I'm moving on... and while I'll still have odd little pains in my heart for this former friend when I think of her I'm forgiving us both. Myself for being weak albeit human and having an off day that resulted in this loss and her for apparently being months ahead of me in killing this friendship.

I have been the recipient of many blessings this year, a loving family that loves me just as I am, a new boss/old friend making a dream come true with a position that no one else but me was ever considered for which makes me feel that there's something redeeming and worthwhile in me after all, the new friends I've made at my new job, my old friends from my old job, my blogging friends and online friends who accept what little scraps of time I'm able to give and my childhood friends who have found their way back into my life after all these years of separation, can you imagine my joy? what a blessing they are! the friendship my husband and me share with a particular couple who we are slowly socializing with more often... yes there's been lots of blessings in the friendship area of my life.

May the new year fill your heart and life with love, real, genuine, true, abiding love.