New Friends with Old Friends

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When someone who was once your friend, tries to contact you after two years and you ignore it and they continue to press, what are you supposed to do? I put myself in their shoes and decided that if I was the one who screwed up and I was trying to get in touch with someone I hurt, I would want some kind of response, even if I didn’t deserve it. I would want a chance. So, I gave him that chance. I gave him the chance, but I made it clear that I was not someone who sat and nodded along with “I did this but you did that” bullshit anymore. If I didn’t do anything, I will not tolerate being told I did just so he can feel like he deserved less of the fault. 

Hearing the words “I’m sorry” is something everyone likes to hear when they deserve to hear it, but it does not matter unless the words are sincere and you will never know if the words are sincere until it is proven to you after the whole forgiveness part. It’s a tricky situation. I wanted to keep my guard up. I wanted to make it seem like I had a wall up but it’s hard to do that with a person you were so close with before. Immediately I gave in and heard myself say “I love you” and I immediately felt regret. I felt like I betrayed myself by “giving in.” But then I remembered that I promised to say how I felt from now on. Wasn’t it just a few months ago that I decided to spread the love? Wasn’t it just a few months ago when I decided that the way to live my life was by telling the people I love that I loved them while I had the chance. And that’s what I did. And that’s how I feel. I love him because he was a friend for a long time and whether or not this friendship continues into our adult lives, I will always have a love for this person. 

The ages 15 to 25 are brutal when it comes to change. The people you knew in high school are not the same people today. Some change for the worse, some change for the better. You’d be surprised at how many change for the better. I’ve had brief encounters with a couple people from high school that I was not friends with because I didn’t think they were very nice people back then, but today my opinions have changed drastically. I couldn’t believe how different it was talking to them, catching up and if someone asked me three years ago if I thought I would be doing that with these people, I would have laughed, “No way in hell.” 

I know that I have changed a lot from when I graduated from high school and I have to let myself accept the fact that others have changed as well. There were two specific people in my mind that I was the closest I’d ever been with anyone and I never thought I would be friendly with them again. But recently I have opened my mind a little more to see what these people have changed into and I am satisfied with one and certainly against the other. And that’s okay. I’m not saying to give everyone who wronged you in the past another chance, because sometimes your life is just better without these people in them, but don’t close yourself off from the chance to gain a little more knowledge about them. I recently learned a lot about this friend I’m talking to again and it really got me thinking if this was a good idea. My mind was kind of scattered while catching up because I was letting myself go a little but at the same time scolding myself for doing that so soon. I did manage to keep some things to myself though because there’s nothing worse than completely opening your heart to someone again only to find out it was huge mistake a month later. I want to move slowly and carefully into this familiar but unfamiliar territory and it’s not because I don’t trust this person, it’s because I don’t trust myself to be careful when opening up again. I spent my whole life trusting too quickly and too easily and though it got me a lot of different kinds of friends, it caused a lot of destruction as well. I don’t regret it though, because now I know. Lesson learned. Learn from my mistakes and all the other cliche`s you can think of. 

I guess what I’m trying to get across here is that we are all human. We all make mistakes, we all forgive either too quickly or we don’t forgive at all and we should learn from each other so we can balance our faults. Yeah, maybe I did dive into the friendship too quickly yesterday because it was so familiar, but maybe thats okay, because we’re older and we talked and we listened and we agreed and hopefully we learned. 

Time will tell though, won’t it?


Xo Al