The day started so well. A weepy session with the therapist. Good and cathartic. The missed reunion. Acceptance of the inability to do what I used to with ease. (Oh, so hard!) The sorely missed friends.
Then, surprise! A long visit with my college beau's freshman year roommate. We all lived on the same hall with a slew of nice people, and Alan was as much a friend of mine as any of the guys on our floor. I love Alan. I was thrilled that he emailed me that he'd have a free afternoon. Come on over! I have no idea why, but we've both have always found it so easy to talk. About everything. And seeing him reminded me that I'm still a person. And still the person I was. The Fran Alan has known for thirty years. This doesn't happen to me very often these days. Let's just say it was a nice change of pace.
It's so strange to me that as my college love fell to pieces, I lost my first buddies- the ones from Freshman year. They no more belonged to the beau than to me. But they (the guys) kicked me out of the guys club. Maybe that's the way it works when I crossed the line and had an intense, very difficult relationship (that lasted for years) with one of them. One of them becomes my boyfriend. Boom. I'm kicked out of the club. I'm not so sure I would have been allowed to stay without the boyfriend. There are no girls in the club.
They still vacation together just about every year. Stag. Where they can be together- wifeless- and be BOYS. (And I don't mean finding women and cheating. No, no, no! That's not the point at all.) It's this boy camaraderie thing. I didn't understand this back then, and I don't understand it now. I was a fun part of the bunch. I guess now I'd be in the way if they wanted to complain about their wives. Speaking with Alan the other day and speaking with the ex-beau (The anger went kaput a long time ago-eventually, it gets silly), they're both happy. And if they complained, I bet it's just part of "the boys getting together without the wives" mode. It must be de rigueur.
Chip and I never want to be anywhere without the other. We're attached at the hip, because we both like it that way. Karen and Jerry were like that. I guess this answers why I'm no longer in the club. Not if I can't abide the rules. I just don't understand this need for maleness unleashed. I know there's a lot of complaining about spouses that goes on. I don't get it. I'm glad Alan's marriage has been and is a good one. He's a good man and deserves no less.
I rewrote and rewrote like a mad person after that. Once the fingers start moving and the eyes become like laser beams, I can't stop. Even when my body is horribly tense and tired and telling me to Please Stop. I don't and go to bed at 3 a.m. feeling miserable. Which means Chip goes to bed at 3 a.m., because I'm physically unable to shut all lights, air conditioners...myself. Damnit.
And I always say (I can't help it), "Chip, I got nothing done today." This has to be more than tiresome. Poor man.
So what the hell happened to put me in that downward spiral? I received a friendship request from my estranged junior high, high school friend, one of a special few, on FB. Mind you, decades after severing our friendship. Okay, I have an inkling why she dropped me like a hot potato. But the request had no note on it. Nothing at all. It was then that I discovered how goddamned angry I am for her blowing me off all those years before.
That was a surprise. I suppose there are an awful lot of people whom I don't have much faith in. Whatever the fuck they do or do not do doesn't hurt, because I never have any expectations. This is not one off those instances. It sure would have been good to have a friend like that in the same fucking city these past twenty some odd years. But it's always been difficult for me to be angry at my closest friends. (Not that this happens very often.) In my gut, there has always lived a little gremlin that insists that "nice" girls don't get angry. If I can banish this annoying creep, I can do away with the fear of rejection that lives along side it. Holy maturity Batman!
I sent a note saying I was stupified, angry, and at a loss. What does she want? Now, after all this time.? Her response to me has been encouraging I think there can be a reconnection. What that will be is a mystery to both of us. We'll just take it slow. And see. I need this like a loch in kop. (Hole in the head.)
We have just heard from a friend that his life has fallen apart. I'm not keeping anything from you. I really don't know much more than that.
FYI, while I promise I will always be honest with you, I will and always have respected the privacy of others.
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