Everyman

Begin here. This spot.
Center of the universe.
Now, in this season.


I am touched by your outpouring. Hit a nerve, though, didn't I? Sorry about that. But I'm really good at hitting nerves. Which is why you read here, but imagine that in a friend. Yeah, I thought so. We've all lost friendships, and known that it was, at least partly, if not mostly, our own faults. We all have regrets. Our lives change in juttering, jarring, jangling, gaps of dismay, guilt and unpleasantly mixed feelings. We've all been there. You are not alone. And as much as I feel thus, neither am I. No more than we all are, ultimately.

And in this little reading spot where perhaps a score of souls drop in, in drib and drabs, this cozy nook for quiet, waving friendships, we all remembered our faded companionships. I imagine you with a cup of tea in an armchair in the corner, another browsing the shelves, overlapping perhaps a half an hour, a few minutes, then one leaves, then the other, and I stand behind the counter alone for a while as people on the street gaze in the window, examine something for a moment then decide to walk on. I'll close up when I feel like it, or just stay open because I have nowhere else to be. And I've got a good book. Or an idea to write down, anyway. Do the crossword, read the funnies, pet the cat.

Those are the numbers, about twenty regular visitors, with perhaps another twenty to forty more who happen here once, or off and on, and decide not to return, each day. Blame the vicissitudes of the search engines. None of the people I know from my ordinary life read here. A few have poked their noses in for a look, nodded in tolerant bafflement, then never returned. A woman who was my sweetest friend in seventh and eighth grade comes by, occasionally sending me an email to comment. A friendship that both of us remember fondly, and although our lives diverged, we left a space for each other, even though we neither of us knew it for many long years.

Please, think no ill of my now-former-friend. She made an honest, hard choice. She gleamed and basked in my harsh friendship for a very long time. I commend her courage, and will always love and admire her. Distance and life differences, the inability to talk in person, have broken us. There is no way to end any relationship that is not awkward and messy.

I was once dumped by a lovely man, in the most clean, complete and painful way. To this day, I hold it up as the paragon of taking it on the chin. His chin. We'd been dating for a couple of months, I was going through the divorce and he was a sweetly healing rebound relationship. Then I got the call that my unit would be activated to Gulf War I. He told me that evening that he would not be seeing me again. THAT took guts. But it was so honest, he was not going to let me hold out hopes, or let the circumstances try to soften the blow - but actually muddy the issue. Hurt like lemon juice after the grater went over my skin. But I dealt better with that clean cut than with any other rejection. To this day, I send blessings down on his head for treating me like the tough cookie I am. And letting me go when it would have been easier on him to draw it out. That such a good human being would like me and treat me with dignity, went a long way to showing me how to value myself. We really weren't a good fit, but we had a good time in that moment in between.

Then, I met D.

So, if you are reading here and you know the friend I mentioned in the last post, keep it to yourself. It doesn't matter. This is a common story. I tell it because I always believe that the more detailed personal stories are the most universal. We are Everyman when we describe the color of the buttons, the smell of the bread baking, the taste of the tears.

And if you are that now former friend, don't torture yourself. You made a decision, stick to it. Don't come by here anymore. Trust your instincts, trust yourself. Give it a year, if you want to reassess. For now, stay away, delete the bookmark, delete my old email, blacklist my address.

As Mrs. Cosmopolite says, "It'll never get better if you pick at it."