It is one thing to let relationships become houseplants that wither and die. Of course, you had the best of intentions. You meant to water them. You wanted to get them enough sunlight. You hoped they'd revive themselves after your neglect was apparent and if they don't...well, it's not like you really cared, cause if you did, you would have done something to keep that from happening.
It is quite another thing to cut someone off from you. Having never done this before, I find that it feels harsh. I feel like a bad person. I am sensitive and being sensitive is hard.
Two people who have been very difficult for me to be around both asked me to get over it and stop behaving like they did something wrong. I told both of them that I didn't want to speak to them any longer. Now they suddenly want my friendship back. One was the very person who drove me to find this new blog address. The other is a friend from a long time ago who I recently wrote about. As I put it somewhere, she demanded everything I had, then took my heart out and stomped on it and asked for more.
I had different things to say to them. To him I was cold. Very cold. I told him there was no point in being friends. He would simply invade my life in ways that would slowly spiral out of control and I would be embarrassed and unduly stressed and there would be no one to blame but me because this has already happened before.
To her I was slightly kinder, but not much. I used words that had been used on me, to cut me free from a friend, to give her space from me. In a way, I see the reasons she had clearer now; I understand why she did that. And so, I borrowed her words and gave them to that supposed friend.
Neither responded. Perhaps they could see that I was not going to relent. I can be very extreme sometimes. My words were very cold. They both pushed me too far and if I actually acted like everything was okay and I could just pretend to be their friend again, I would hate myself.
The only person who has survived this sort of emotional fallout has been him, the love of my lifetime, Eric. No matter how many times I swear to myself that I will never look at his face or hear his voice or feel his touch, I always relent.
I want so much to be a good person and a good friend but I find that it requires a lot of my time and energy and frankly, it is difficult to maintain. I would much rather read, knit, or write than muster up the enthusiasm some people seem to want so badly.
As I contemplate being mean to those two, I realize that nothing could make me return to those times when I loathed seeing their phone calls, or answering their texts, when we spent time together and I felt like I was watching a reality tv show I couldn't turn off, or especially when I had something to say and it went completely unheard.
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