friends

friends and friendship have been on my mind a lot lately, mainly because my best friend from high school is coming to visit in a few weeks. initially i was nervous...i mean we haven't seen each other in about 15 years. but since finding each other on facebook we email almost every day and have reconnected in a way i didn't think was possible. it's like time stood still and we picked up our friendship as grownups. it is perhaps the best thing that happened to me last year, or at least right up there in the top 10.

renewing this wonderful relationship has made me examine my current and past friendships, something i've always done anyway. i've ranted about friendships here a lot...i think because deep down i'm so insecure. i have tried to talk to my daughter about latching on to one person exclusively only to be disappointed by that person in the end...and yet that is often what i've done.

i've been fortunate to have some really wonderful friends during my life....but i also realize that there are people whom i thought were wonderful friends who really weren't in the end. like everyone i have had people who've drifted out of my life for one reason or another, i think that's natural. you're brought together by circumstance and when circumstances change you lose touch. but i've had two friendships that ended badly and because of that i second guess myself on the type of friend i am.

i think it's time to stop beating myself up. i can't make someone stay my friend or invest in a relationship; they either do or they don't. they either take me as i am or they don't. my very best friend...the hubs...takes me warts and all, and he knows me better than anyone. i have a couple of friends that i still consider true friends. i may not talk to them or see them every day, but whenever i do we always fall back into sync and i know that they care about me and they don't judge me and....they're just good people.

today i went to lunch with a group of girls that i once considered very close friends, one of whom i latched on to almost obsessively. (that was one of the friendships that ended badly). since our circumstances changed (we no longer work together) we have drifted...or i should say i have drifted...they have remained a group and become an even tighter group. for a long time now this has bothered me tremendously....that i was the outcast. that insecure part of me wondered what was wrong with me...why didn't they like me. today i realized that....you know what? it's ok. i don't share their interests and i'm at least a decade older than some of them. we are at different points in our lives and the common denominator that brought us together is long gone. i guess i've known this for awhile actually, but kept trying to ignore it, kept trying to stay on the fringe of that group. today i found out that one had suffered a personal tragedy and i had no idea. i felt like an idiot for asking the question that brought this subject up...but really? how was i to know. aside from feeling horrible for bringing it up and sad for her tragedy i was a little mad that no one had told me. i mean it's one thing to not share the day to day things going on in people's lives, but major things....i thought i was at least still friend enough to have been told. but...i'm not. and....that's ok.