I have always had an odd idea about friends, I guess. I suppose I’m a bit of a Pollyanna about the whole friends thing. And don’t get me wrong, I have had some great friends, some who are still my friends all these years later.
Maybe they are to blame for how I perceive friendship. We’ve had our good times and some really bad times. We’ve enjoyed hours of laughter and years of not speaking, often because the tears were still flowing because of something one of us had said or done.
And still, we would find our way back to one another.
Then there are those odd people we let into our lives, people we once thought of as friends but never really were. Sure, they pretended to be. They might have even thought they were.
When we are in our 20s and even our 30s, we create a big circle of “friends.” I don’t know the reason why, but it can be both alluring and delusional at the same time. Being friends takes a lot of work. It is time and labor intensive. I truly believe that you can only have a handful of real friends at any point in time because there is only so much time in the day to maintain a friendship.
The others are really just acquaintances. It’s the “Hi how are you?” kind of friend. I know I’ve touched on this topic before, but as I look back at my time in Florida, I have started to realize that I once again fell into the trap of befriending people who didn’t deserve even a moment of my time.
Now, before any of you in Florida start thinking I’m talking about you, I’m not. If you’re still connected to me on Facebook and I respond occasionally to your posts, you’re good. Instead, I am talking about a cadre of friends who became my friends because of that ill conceived and poorly executed thing I once called a marriage.
For some reason, I didn’t take all those lessons learned in life and use them over the past seven years. Instead, I fell for the old routine of letting my now ex’s friends become mine.
I look back at this and once again wonder what was I drinkin’? These people were not my ilk at all. They were all needy losers who hovered around the ex like chicks flock to a mother hen. She loved that role, by the way. For all I can tell, she still does.
For much of the time it was an out of body experience for me. I would smile, chit-chat, occasionally laugh, all the time wondering deep down what the hell I was ever doing spending any of my previous time with these people.
Here’s the cast of characters. We had her high school friend Wes who had broken up her relationship with her one time future ex Alan because he secretly wanted Michelle (yes, Christine, Wes had the hots for Michelle). We had his wife, who was nice, but I think perhaps afraid of her own shadow, much less the general public. We had her other friend, Moon, who ended up staying with us for a couple days until I demanded she leave. She had not a shred of decency, changing her clothes with the door open so I could get the full-meal deal in terms of views. I admit I would have never complained if the view had been a pleasant one. It wasn’t. Then there was the maintenance man turned photographer (DB) and his mouthy live in (Anne Marie) who would invite us to sail on their boat where they liked to be in the buff. Again, not a view I would want. Rounding out the flock was her usual collection of people with more issues than Life magazine.
And everyone wonders why I was so moody. Sure, I was in a nightmare of a marriage with someone I had barely known before I skipped off to Florida to be with her. I will take the blame for that. And I can’t really blame her for surrounding herself with all these “needies” because it made her feel important.
What I can do is blame myself for falling into this trap… again. I know better than to try to make a significant other’s friends my friends. It never works. First, if your significant other has hot female friends, eventually you want to shag them. Diablo had a few who fell into this category. Sure, you play coy about the whole thing, but if given a guilt-free, punishment free moment, you would do the big nasty in a heartbeat.
So you can’t get too close to them because, 1) it might happen or 2) it doesn’t and your significant other is convinced it did or will. This is a no-win.
It’s tough to be friends with the guy side of the equation also. First, you wonder if the reverse is true, thinking that, 1) perhaps they want to sleep with your signifiant other, 2) they already have or 3) they are right now.
This all equals out in the end, though. Eventually, you split the sheets and all her friends retreat along with her, like the Southern general leading the loyal troops back into the mists of the Civil War after they got a whooping from the North. They slip back into the shadows of your mind, only vague memories.
Well, they used to be memories. Then God invented Facebook. Even though you are no longer actual “Friends,” you continue to see their ugly mugs and banal comments because they are “Friends of Friends.”
So, occasionally I see them once again. And every time I do, I am reminded of why we aren’t friends now and never really were. That, my “friends,” is a very good lesson to hold onto. Perhaps this time I will.
In the Emerald City, looking at my “Friends” list and wondering who will be raptured next – oops, there went another one,
– Robb