The ins and outs of a young library media specialist's life. Rock, rock on.

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

The Miracle of Advertising

A few months back I discovered that the person I called my best friend in the whole world, the person I had been friends with for the majority of my lifetime, the person with whom I shared an honorary PhD in Dirty Dancingology, was insanely jealous of of my boyfriend. To the point where she decided she'd rather not be friends with me at all than live with the fact she'd have to share my time with someone else.

I suppose I should've seen it coming. Even though L and Chris got along really well, she was forever making comments about how much time I would spend with him, how it was insane to date someone who lived 6 hours away (at the time), and how our relationship could only end in heartbreak. Still, the fact that she and Chris were friends seemed very promising to me; she and my previous boyfriend had hated each other with the ferocity of a thousand suns. Seriously, if they spoke two words to each other in the course of an evening I considered it a huge success.

While Chris was still living in New York it was easier to ignore. She did inform me that she was put out when I chose to spend most of last summer in New York, but otherwise she seemed to be able to keep her jealousy in check. It wasn't until I told her that Chris would be moving out to Boston that everything broke down. "He's moving out here? So soon? Don't you think it's too soon? It's too soon! You're going to regret it. Wait, you're going to live with him? This is ridiculous." And so on, and so on. You get the point.

And while I understood her need to speak her mind (often, and to countless other people, even), it became a bit tiresome week after week. One night I was out with a mutual friend of ours and she happened to mention that L had been talking about me- had, in fact, been talking about me to everyone we knew. Maybe she was trying to garner support of her "Chris stays in NY" campaign, maybe she didn't think it would get back to me, maybe she just needed to vent. I didn't care. I was angry. Then our mutual friend also informed me that L had admitted to having a crush on one of our other friends- a girl- and it was then it dawned on me. L was so crazy jealous because she wanted to be with me.

Ohhhhhh.

I resisted that idea for a while, assuring myself that she would've said something before, that there was no way I wouldn't have noticed. I told myself that I couldn't know that was true. I ignored the fact that people had been teasing me for years that L had a crush on me. She wasn't gay! I would've known! She dates men! But in the end, I knew my hunch was right. It didn't surprise me or freak me out, nor would I have cared if she had said she was or was not gay. But she definitely didn't trust me as much as I thought she did, and that hurt.

To make a long story short, I never ended up confronting her, she freaked out when Chris moved here (for various reasons), Chris and I moved out, L decided to not ever speak to me again. End of story, right?

No. Me, being the sap that I am, decided it wasn't good enough to leave things at that. I thought, for once in my life I should just suck it up and be the bigger person. Pride and holding grudges have always been my weakness and I knew that I could play this not speaking to each other game until the end of days. But it just didn't feel right, to end a 10 year friendship with an email confrontation. So I wrote her back and told her all the things I had been thinking for months and months. I spent time pondering how I wanted to word things. I worked at it. I told her if she ever wanted to talk, like really talk, I would make time.

The response:
"I think of you in a far off city or a boat or something without phones or email access."
-L

Wha huh? I live approximately .5 miles from you. Apparently my grand gesture, my Buddhist philosophy of being the "bigger person", did not play out exactly as I had thought it would. Oh well. C'est la vie.

And the reason I decided to finally write this all out? No, it wasn't some overwhelming desire to tell the world about a failed friendship. It was this ad on a website that suddenly reminded me of her:


Props to Google for its simplicity. And who knows? Maybe if L had seen this ad a year ago things would have turned out a bit differently.

16 Comments:

Blogger Aaron rocks hardcore!

It's a sad story, and I don't mean to make light of it, but: that Google ad made the post. Too funny.

Something very similar happened to me years ago with a guy friend. Depressing, really. I totally empathize.

11:05 AM

 
Blogger Stefanie rocks hardcore!

Oh my. That is a way better "how our friendship ended" story than any I have tucked away.

I assume L does not read your blog, right?

11:32 AM

 
Blogger shelleycoughlin rocks hardcore!

Ace- I thought about saving that ad to somehow incorporate it into my FC guest blog spot, but really, it was meant for L.

Stefanie- I'm 95% sure she does not read it. Let's keep our fingers crossed, shall we?

11:51 AM

 
Blogger CMC rocks hardcore!

At least she didn't blame you for her lesbianism - I got that from my best male friend in high school...but we're okay now. I wish your story had turned out like that.

1:30 PM

 
Blogger CarpeDM rocks hardcore!

Oh, that's sad. But in the end, it sounds to me like you're better off without her. Even if she is gay, a good friend is going to be happy for you when you meet someone that is as spectacular as Chris sounds.

I have an old friend I just finally couldn't handle being around anymore. She was constantly negative (the world should blow up), a foul weather friend (you're too damn happy) and had physically attacked me a few times when she lost her temper. I just stopped calling and returning calls. So far it has worked, I've only run into her once in the past 3 years.

Sometimes you out grow people. Sometimes people act like an idiots. I think we're both better off.

1:48 PM

 
Blogger L Sass rocks hardcore!

Wow, I didn't see that ending coming. I was thinking of a friendship of mine that ended when my friend could not get over her opposition to a boyfriend I'd had more than a year after I broke up with him!

L sounds like a confused little girl, I'm sorry that you got hurt by it. Let's hope that she knows herself better one of these days.

2:21 PM

 
Blogger indigomast rocks hardcore!

Aw its sad when a friendship ends -especially a ten year one. well her loss :)

2:27 PM

 
Blogger stinkybomb rocks hardcore!

wow. I can understand your anger. Sometimes having a "break up" with your friends can be very difficult and ugly. Like any relationship, we put time and invest our energy into these people, whom we allow access into our lives.
It does sound that you tried to reapproach the relationship with a bigger heart. How sad of her to not be able to see that.

You must be really hot!!!
lol

3:25 PM

 
Anonymous Anonymous rocks hardcore!

I know I shouldn't laugh... but that ad..... really made me laugh.

And ouch. What a cutting email.

Someone needs some salsa for that chip on their shoulder.

5:34 AM

 
Blogger stilettoheights rocks hardcore!

this happened to me almost exactly with my "best friend" since I was 2 years old.

I kept trying to "do the right thing" (not in the Spike Lee sense) but she never cared enough to acknowledge my attempts.

sigh....

like the google ad though

7:17 AM

 
Blogger Aaron rocks hardcore!

"You must be really hot!!!"

Actually, she looks like Anne Ramsey. Nice personality, though.

7:32 AM

 
Blogger Aaron rocks hardcore!

(please don't kill me)

7:32 AM

 
Blogger shelleycoughlin rocks hardcore!

Oh, Ace. You do know that the next time I see you there will be some breaking of your limbs going on, correct?

7:36 AM

 
Blogger shelleycoughlin rocks hardcore!

Oh, and also? I feel strangely bad about potentially "outing" someone online. Even an anonymous someone. I'm sorry if the post was offensive to anyone. Even though that ad? Still awesome.

8:16 AM

 
Blogger briliantdonkey rocks hardcore!

Wow,

That was a pretty brutal email response. I would say you have more than done your part for which she shot your attempt down. Eventually she will probably reach out and try to do the same. Look at the bright side, you have that time to think of your response. I am getting a "Oh so NOW you want to talk, move to a deserted island and call me on your coconut phone' response vibe. though that may not be a good idea.

BD

12:55 AM

 
Blogger Lisa rocks hardcore!

Wow.
I was kinda feeling like I had a similar story with an ex-best friend of mine, until you went the lesbian route and then I lost you. Good story. Better ad.

8:06 PM

 

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