The Letdown
For over a month now I’ve told myself not to write about this. However, it’s become too heavy a load for me to maintain internally and now, I’m reverting to the one medium through which I know I can express my discontent.
My entire life, I’ve felt that respecting friendship is paramount to a happy existence. I’ve grown into a man who doesn’t let many in—a by-product of insecurity about whether most people are trustworthy or willing to reciprocate the kind of compassion I inject into relationships. And overwhelmingly often, I am met with reciprocity because I am surrounded by good friends.
This makes it all the more difficult to experience the exact opposite, as it comes in a person with whom I felt I shared a positive and mutually beneficial friendship. It makes it difficult to type these words knowing that my continued efforts to be supportive, non-confrontational and understanding have resulted in nothing but undue animosity and unfair, public mistreatment. It’s become impossible for me to comprehend how a person who has been given so much slack—all of it undeserved—can turn on a dime, negate any semblance of trustworthiness and even go so far as to stoop to defamation in a shared social environment when the most appropriate action is thankfulness.
I am appalled and disappointed in the behavior of a person who I called a friend. I am depressed at the notion of interacting with this person knowing they have been slanderous and cruel to me in my absence. And if I could avoid it, I would; but in no way do I plan to forgo the other relationships I’ve been so lucky to cultivate to keep a distance from this person.
There’s always a lesson to be learned from behavior that doesn’t seem to make sense in a social situation; and for me, it’s that I have no plans to change who I am or pull back on the emotions that I outwardly share with the people for whom I deeply care. It’s critical never to betray someone because of a mistake I’ve made myself. It’s completely out of line to go back on a promise. It’s of the utmost importance to take this experience and say, “I’ll never do that to someone I care about.” Because once I do, this whole entry will mean absolutely nothing.
I would never have wanted this to go so sour, but my tank has run dry on the situation. It’s over. I’m going to move on. And if this person continues to do what they have done, I’m going to disregard it and be just who my true friends have come to expect.
5 months ago