Be a better friend

Right now I’m at a point where I must decide the fate of two new friendships. This is a new thing for me, to decide if I want to keep a friend in my life or not. I’m finding a lot of hard questions without clear answers. D is the first. I have been told that our intimate relationship too recent and our experiences too intense for our friendship to work. Those who say that may be right.

The other is T. The recent fights we have had have revealed things about her I don’t really like. She keeps saying she wants to be friends but I’m no longer I sure I believe her.

And what it really comes down to is that if my friends represent me, I would prefer friends like D than friends like T. The ironic thing is it might be easier to have T in my life than D, but I never done things the easy way before…

Is it better to hide your feelings from others to prevent harm or bare them and force their hand? Is it more selfish to state what you want and have the other person make the choice or to make the choice, hide your desires and carry the burden yourself? And which is truly more selfish? There are days I would argue for the right to chose for myself, regardless of the pain, but I may have lived in darkness all my life, protected from others’ desires, and not know the true pain of knowing.

If D can find the maturity to be a better friend to me, can I actually let go of my romantic feelings for him and accept only friendship? Or will denial of my feelings for him rend our relationship? Or is there another way that allows me to acknowledge my feelings and integrate them into our friendship?

That is the question…

D is missing out on something he really wants this year because of a timing issue. The program he wants to apply to require certain submissions by the 28th of September. However, part of the application he can’t complete until the 6th of October. There’s no way for him to get around it. Last year, he would would have been okay, the date was the 10th of October. This year tho, the dates changed and left him out in the cold. The program is run by people I work for so I want to find a way to help him out but there’s really no way around it. It’s clearly spelled out in a company memo. They changed the deadlines this year and he’s missing it by 8 days. Heartbreaking.

A friend from work is moving away tomorrow. Our office gave her a going-away party today which was wonderful. But she had an appointment at 1pm and so I had to dump her rather unceremoniously on the curb without a proper goodbye. So on my way home today, I dropped by her house to give her a proper goodbye. I didn’t have to but I think it’s what a good friend should do. One of the little things that sets friends apart from mere acquaintances.

I shouldn’t feel so lonely tonight. I just came from a friend’s promotion party. I met some new people and hung out with some others who will probably remain life-long friends. It was a good time and yet, I’m lonely.

I’m also struggling with finding people to do things with. D had been a fix for that. He was the person I did things with and now he’s just one of the people who I do things with.

I found a new jealousy today. As things change between me and D, he is returning to doing much with other friends. I never meant to keep him from doing that and mostly I think it was a by-product of the intensity between us. But now he is doing things with other people, things that I would like to do like visit London. And he’s not even asking for me to come.

So I’m jealous. Or perhaps the inverse of jealousy because I’m not really resenting the people he’s doing these things with so much as that I’m not getting to do them with him too.

I’ve been out of the loop with my friends because I’ve been traveling with my family the last 2 weeks. Today was kind of a catch up day.

My first friend, K, called around 11. She’s having problems with her marriage and wanted to talk to me because I’m the only “divorcee” she knows.

She and her husband are old friends of me and my Ex. So while I was waiting for K to arrive, I called J and told him what was going on. We talked for a little while about our recent travels and promised to have lunch or dinner together soon.

K arrived and we talked for a couple hours. I wanted to avoid giving her advise though I don’t know how she heard what I said. I told her divorce isn’t the end of the world but that she needs to talk to her husband. I hope I helped.

After she left, I called A who I hadn’t talked to in more than 2 weeks, time zone differences suck. It was good to talk to her.

Later, I called J back to make sure he knew what was going on and that he was okay talking about divorce between our 2 old friends seeing as, in many, ways it is like talking about our own. I hope that I was considerate of him and his feeling.

Finally, I called B who has been neglected because of my recent travel. It was propitious timing. He was having a rough day, as I caught him just finished taking a co-worker to the ER and one of his dogs passed away this morning. I miss him badly and it was good to talk to him.

But that’s only 4 friends… The fifth is an absence. I noticed that one of my subscriptions had disappeared. Paddyheg isn’t there any more. He disappeared a while ago but I haven’t been here much and so hadn’t noticed he was gone. I saw a week or so ago some of my posts have deleted comments but didn’t remember who that commenter was. So it was only tonight that I realized that Paddyheg is gone. I hope it’s because he’s happy with what he completed and he’s moved on. I wish the best for him and will miss him.

Some new friends took me to Prague this weekend. They have a sweet dog and travel with him because Europe is very accepting of this. The dog stayed in the room all day as we went out and explored. On Sunday morning, when I woke after 4 hours of sleep, the dog was looking rather desperate for a trip outside. Both T and S were sleeping soundly and I was wide awake.

As we walked, the dog peed himself dry and then took a massive dump in front of one of the small chapels in Prague. I held up a set of strollers while cleaning it up. The dog was much happier when we got back to the room and T & S got another 90 minutes of sleep.

I woke from a dream of him. Intimate. Casual. His waking me upon his arriving home.

I could talk to him tonight. I would like nothing more. But we are separate tonight in part because he needs space. So I will honor that for now and find a new balance to our friendship.

The only way to make a man trustworthy is to trust him.
– Henry Stimson