“I’m not going to change my life just because of someone else’s interpretation of it; they must not know me.” justin timberlake.
When I was a senior in college my best friend Lauren and I got into it. Now, while we can at this point kind of recount the specifics of the fight (seriously, we tried about a month ago), the truth of the matter is it was inconsequential. That our argument was based on our lack of communication. That our friendship returned to her 2 am phone calls waking me out of my sleep to meet her to discuss this crazy guy she was seeing or that crazy friend of ours. That we got back to that and that as different as we were, our friendship has had a certain thickness ever since.
One of my best friends from high school and I at some point during 11th or 12th grade began to drift apart. She worked after school, I played tennis. She went out on the weekends with the people from our high school, I went out with my best girl friends from high schools closer in town. The summer before our freshman year in college we stood in the basement room of a house in Spartanburg mixing drinks amongst all the friends we’d met over the past couple of months. We’d been drinking, yes, when she looked at me and said, “No matter where we are now, Kristin, we were best friends once and we will always be friends.” It’s amazing that since that day our friendship has only gotten stronger. That she is one of my very best friends today. That I was in her wedding, that she named her baby Blakely after me, that I love her with all my heart.
Last night I met up with a friend of mine whom I have known for around 10 years. We had dinner and some wine while out on my parent’s side of town. As we sat there catching up, she told of her weekly Monday night sushi and Wednesday night bowling followed by midnight karaoke. We are different, she and I. She’s out of school but still working at the same restaurant she’s been working at for years. Going out every night, sleeping in every day. She’s different and I love her. She makes me laugh. She doesn’t judge. And a month can go by (or two or three) and there are no nagging phone calls asking where the other of us has been. There’s just an “I miss you!” or a “When can I see you!?” And I really really love that. Effortless.
I was thinking about this and how there are people we are close to in our lives that are so very different than who we are. But with whom, it works. The friendship works. The conversation works. Everything works. And then there are the people you meet that are just like you. So much like you that you tend to, sometimes, go nowhere with. You’re both stubborn or you’re both sensitive or – damn it! – you’re both angry. And how do you fix that?
I have been consciously, over the last week, trying to make an effort to be the best person that I can be. Not to be angry anymore. Because I am better than the person I have lately been. When my mom said “kill with kindness” I scoffed. SCOFFED. I mean, but why? Because I was beaten? Because I was pessimistic?
The sad truth is that I did not used to be pessimistic. Me! Of the hope for the grand! gesture! Pessimistic?? I think not. I used to be filled with hope. I used to, instead, scoff at the people who believe that romantic comedies fill our minds with false hopes. False? What? No way. I used to believe it was real. That really and truly some Mr. Wonderful I’d had my eyes on for so long would sing “Can’t Get Enough of Your Love, Baby” to me while bounding down the bleachers. And when I’d ask him, daintily, “Why me?” he’d tell me I was the first person he thought of in the morning and the last person he thought of at night. And when he’d tell me he was sorry for me having to wait for him to come along I’d just say to him, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.” (Yes, I am ridiculously cheesy.)
Point is, I BELIEVED. In people. In love. In relationships and friendships.
I have to wonder now what it takes to make a friendship last. And if anything ever does.
Do people really do spiteful things just because? Do they cut you out just to see? Do they do things just to be hurtful and mean when they used to be the person that meant the most to you?
In my whole life I think I have always searched for that one! best! friend! You know, the person you’re linked to through everything. And while I do have many a best friend, I am curious if that one can even exist. And IF, you know, that doesn’t exist for friendships, can it really exist for relationships?
On the phone tonight with one of my good friends P, I listened to him bemoan his latest failed relationship and wonder aloud if they could be friends after this, if they could get back together (when he has been saying for months that the end was in sight), and if it is as easy as being cut and dry. I said to him what I thought to be my “truth.” That isn’t the entire purpose of this crazy game we play to find the person you’re meant to spend the rest of your life with? Isn’t that what we’re doing? And you don’t hurt that person once you find them. You hold on to them. Good and tight. But he didn’t believe that, he told me. He didn’t believe that there is one perfect person.
I reached for my journal and wrote the following words: “Is there one perfect and right person for each of us or is it about the journey, are we supposed to have all these stops, feed into this drama, along the way?”
Is it I KNOW THIS IS WANT but I want ALL THESE OTHER EXPERIENCES FIRST and then I’ll come back to IT when I’m ready? Like I board game!
Because if so, I think that’s just bullshit. Total horse shit, if you ask me.
Because I really think it’s a bit ridiculous for someone to put the person they care about in the path of numerous asshats and then think that they can just swing back around and pick them up when they’ve reached the desired mileage on that white horse of theirs. Maybe friendships can roll around and recycle, but relationships? I think not.
