Dear Former Friend,
Ouch! That sounds harsh, but true.
Before the pandemic struck we had a falling out. We were walking and talking, doing laps in a mall, when suddenly you stopped and stormed away from me. Though normally I am the faster of the two, I could not catch up to you as you ran away from me saying only "That was rude!" When I said something about you canceling on me ... again.
Tonight as I as walking in the snow I realized I won't be able to get rid of the ache from our broken friendship until I write it down. I'd send you a letter, but my last words from me to you were "don't worry, you'll never hear from me again." That was 13 months ago. In Before Times.
As we live about 90 minutes apart, and are in different stages, our paths won't cross accidentally. If they did, maybe we would get over each of our pains. Maybe we could at least be acquaintances again. I know you are too stubborn to reach out to me since I also know you don't know how much you hurt me.
Your last text to me (which I deleted when I blocked you) said you were hurt because I threw back at you one time you cancelled on me the time your son was in the hospital nearly dying, and that I am never, ever on time.
I won't even attempt to argue the last point. With you, my dear, I wasn't ever on time. For the past year I studied other relationships to figure out why. It would be easy to say because the drive was long and stressful (I used to think it was a 30 minute drive, turned out to be a 40 minute drive, after I figured that out I allowed more time). It would also be easy to say since you are always 15 minutes early even if I show up an acceptable two to three minutes late for an afternoon gathering, I am already late in your book.
What I realized watching my other friendships is that sometimes I'm the one early and the other person is late, and sometimes I am late and they are there first. You never allowed me the opportunity to be first. You also never asked if everything was okay. I don't hold it against my friends when I wait for them. I hope they don't hold it against me.
Even Don I realized with our friendship you had about an every-other-time cancellation rate. Something I never called you out on until that day in the mall.
Half the time you would cancel our plans either the night before or the morning of. It got to the point I made a back-up set of plans so I didn't feel the day was wasted (our two to three hour visits on a weekend would be closer to four and a half factoring in travel time -- a big chunk of precious time). I also realized after you cancelled, I would be the one to reschedule. I was the one to initiate the get together. I was the one to graciously accept your excuse. I would be the one to reschedule. I can only remember a few times you initiated an online conversation with me. Perhaps once or twice you initiated the visit.
Then I would be late.
You see, my dear, in my heart I was never sure if we were really getting together that day, so I didn't fully carve out that time to be with you. Maybe at the last minute I had to take Ashley in the opposite direction, or I was low on gas, or something else popped up. I didn't text because for most of our friendship we both had flip phones and pay per text plans. Besides, you didn't text except to say you needed to reschedule.
I miss the good parts of our friendship. I miss those two to three hour visits when we'd both shut our phones off and give each other our undivided attention. I miss hearing about your life, and the lives of your family members. I miss that we both work in development and could understand and commiserate with each other's work stories. I miss telling you about Bridge.
When we were together it was great.
That was enough for me to accept your excuses for backing out on our plans. But when you wrote that last text thinking the worst in me -- that I would hold it over you because you cancelled when your son was near death -- that was the final straw.
Friends should think the best of each other. I know I tried.
I don't even recall which son was near death. For that I am sorry. The last time you cancelled on me was in August. You said your stomach was upset. I offered to get together later that day after you had a chance to eat to see how you felt. You agreed. A couple of hours later you said you still were not feeling well. So we skipped that visit. Was that code for your son was dying? Or were you really sick? I'll never know. I assumed it was that your stomach was upset.
A month later I suggested we get together, and we did. You were extra chipper that visit. At one point, though, you said a co-worker was sick and you weren't sure if we would be able to get together. I jokingly said "Don wondered if you'd cancel on me." That's when you stopped and ran off. You admitted you thought about postponing on me, yet were upset when I said it first.
Dear friend, things do come up. I never complained about your cancelling on me, but it would have been nice if you rescheduled since you were the one to cancel. Or sent me a follow-up message to say you were feeling better.
Now that I've written this, hopefully I can release the bad feelings into the universe and move forward.
Love,
Your Former Friend
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