I was never the most popular kid in school, nor the biggest loser (or at least it didn't reach my ears), but I've had my share of friends that came and went, imprinting bits of their lives in my heart and mind. I'm sure everyone has had the experience of looking back on his/her best friend from kindergarten, third grade, eighth grade, senior year, or freshman year of college and wondering about the ups and downs they shared together. At the best of times, no one expects the day that might just come where he/she realizes that what they thought was a knotted friendship was just actually twisted together. In reflection from a short address at my cousin's wedding, all sorts of tensions pull at each person's rope and they begin to unravel themselves, leaving two individual lengths of string as if they had never touched.
I think that, for the first time, I've desperately been pulling at these strings to put them back together. A friend from high school and I have been distancing ourselves for the past several months without actual cause. We've had our objections and arguments, and maybe I assumed that we were closer than we really were, but to sum it up - it hurts. I can't pinpoint when it began to crumble or when I felt it the first, second, or seventh time, but it is something I'm clinging to and I can't tell if that a pro or con. This is where brain and heart collide. The head says move, the heart says stay and try to repair. The thing is, I don't know if I ever meant much to this person, but, at times, they (yes, I'm breaking grammar to keep confidentiality) meant the world to me. I find that this is one of the hardest parts to accept; I won't ever know if their smiles were real, if their laughter was genuine, if their hugs emanated the same gratitude I tried to convey through mine.
While we haven't terminated our friendship officially, I feel that's the path we're going down. We will inevitably be moving onward in our own directions, moving to new states or countries, gaining new friends and partners, and possibly won't see each other for months or even years at a time.
They have changed and so have I. It is as simple, but simultaneously just as complicated, as that.
