uncleal's Diaryland Diary
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Much too long to read, you should probably just skip it.
Well, well, well. It's been a while since I posted last, and I had something VERY IMPORTANT to say. I guess it still is important, I just don't know if I'm ready for the public humiliation it would cause to write about it. I don't exactly know how to say it, and sometimes I wonder if it's just my pregnancy that has made this such an important issue. So, I think I'll post about something else that I think is VERY IMPORTANT and we'll decide after that if I still want to post the other item.
So here goes.
My dearest friend in the whole world is finally coming back to the realization that she rocks! This is so wonderful, because I have always thought of her as my rock in this world, and for her to have been going through all that she has been through with little to no belief in herself, was very hard to watch. I have wanted so badly to shake her and say to her "You are wonderful! You are beautiful! You are strong, and independent, and capable of taking care of your girls, and yourself. Just step up and do so!" But of course, when you are in the pits of despair, it's hard to look at yourself and see any of those things. She has been working hard on taking the first step towards becoming truly independent again, and I hope she continues on the path. I also hope she realizes that being independent doesn't mean she can't ask friends (me) for help, but it does mean not putting up with complete and utter bullshit just because you think you have to. The next step is going to be a very big and difficult one. It is one I am willing to help her with - as much as an outsider can help. But it is something she ultimately has to do on her own. She is carrying dead weight with her. It is not helpful, nor healthy for anyone in that household to keep supporting the dead weight. However, like I said it is a big and difficult change to make, and I know it will take time. I'll be here to support her through every painstaking moment of it... well for some of it I may be 1500 miles away, but I'll be as "here" as I can be. I am just so proud of her right now, it's hard not to want her to do everything RIGHT NOW! Of course I've been there, and you can't just do things RIGHT NOW! you have to have the time, and the resources, not to mention the courage to take care of everything. It's not easy. I know. but it doesn't mean I can't get excited, see the end of the tunnel, and want to jump to hyperspace and get there.
Hell for all that, I only have 2 1/2 months before I move, and I'm ready to quit my job RIGHT NOW! and move. And I won't even have the keys to the new place until May 1st, and it does me a world of good to stay at work until June 1st.
Anyway, the bottom line is: I'm so damn proud of her! I am loving watching her open up to the possibility that all is not lost.
Well, this kind of leads into the other thing I was going to write about, and while it gives me crazy flutters to write about it in my blog, I feel like I must get it out.
FBF I don't know why she plagues me so. Obviously, she is not showing up on my doorstep, stalking me the way a normal human ought to. And yet, not a day goes by that she doesn't intrude on my life. I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about her. I find myself consumed with the desire to talk to her during any moment of downtime in my day. I sit at my computer staring uselessly at my task list, and suddenly I think to myself, "If I were FBF, I would probably know what to do. Hell, I'd probably have so much more to do, and would just be able to check one thing off the list after the next." I'm feeling exceptionally great, driving home from a satisfactory day at the office, thinking about how well my life is going, suddenly FBF pops into my head and I think, "I wonder how she is doing. I hope everything is going well for her." I used to dream about her. I would dreams that she needed very badly to have a friend she could count on. That all her friends really only liked her when she was a 'good time gal' but when she got lonely, or depressed, or spent too many nights looking up to the stars thinking "That's where we have to go to make things right," they all disappeared in her. In my dreams I unwittingly showed up at just the right time. Of course I had other dreams. Dreams where I would be shopping at the mall, and would hear her voice calling out to me, I would look up and there she was ready to fight me. This dream, I know, came directly from a story she once told me where this type of thing had happened to her. Somebody had seen her at the mall, came over pretending to giver her a hug to "let bygones be bygones" as it were, but instead of hug, this girl tried to land a punch. I had lost all track of being able to know for sure how any of her life was going. She changed journals, she locked me out. I suppose I was not the only one she was locking out, there were others that she was not interested in knowing her personal life anymore, but I was definitely not a person who could just send her an email, and ask for a link to her new journal address. And I admit, as I have so many times in the past, that I checked up on any address I could to see a glimpse of how she was doing. Some of that seemed petty, I wanted to know that she was suffering without me. I wanted to know that her life was empty without me. I think this stems from the fact that our friendship was a lot like a bf/gf type relationship. It felt more like a 'break-up' when we stopped being friends. Not a day had gone by in those days when I didn't look forward to seeing her. Even if it did drag down my good mood to see her so sad, so depressed, longing so hard for something I didn't agree was so great. I may not have always wanted to spend lots of time with her because of that, but I did always want to see her before going to bed. And sometimes, I knew that just my sitting next to her was enough to make her feel marginally better. Even if she wasn't in the mood to talk to me.
Recently, she took one tiny step out into the open. she left a comment on someone else's blog. She left that comment, it was short and sweet, and I don't even usually read that particular blog. I found it by cruising someone else's blog roll. Bored, desperate for something to keep me busy at this all to easy job of mine. I read the journal, read the comments, and there she was. I wouldn't have even followed the link back to her, except that he had asked her why she didn't exist anywhere else, and she admitted that she was in hiding from "certain people on the internet." Even at that point it hadn't occurred to me that it could be her. I had come to the conclusion that she had given up on-line journaling preferring instead to keep her journal on her computer, in Notepad, or MS WORD or something. I knew she was still keeping a journal, it keeps her centered to get all her feelings out in print. To write down all her antics so she can remember them later. To script out how she wants to say something so she doesn't stumble over it later. But I had decided that if I couldn't find her she wasn't there. I followed the link, thinking I would come across some locked journal, or some teen-ager who was purposely coming out on the internet to hurt her BF in some way. I hadn't expected to find FBF. It was practically moments after she had posted her comment, which, to me made it fate, because only coincidence could have brought me to that blog which I don't normally read, and to the comments, which I don't generally bother to look at, and to click her link, which I thought was going to be some crap. Even when I found the jolly roger on her page, it didn't strike me that I had found her. It wasn't until I had read some of the front entry, and realized that I recognized her voice, that I nearly screamed with... what? joy? excitement? amazement? I'm not sure. I know I was happy to have found her. And I was afraid she would know in a heartbeat that I had found her and would take down the journal. I felt that knowing what was going on was better than not knowing. Since I didn't think it could possibly make worse the obsession going on in my head already. I have been reading her with some regularity ever since. I read about her good days, and her bad days. I read about her making fun of boys, and planning extravaganzas. I am happy to see her so happy. It makes me sad that she has still done nothing to make herself feel fulfilled, but I suppose she will get around to that as soon as karaoke and pub crawls no longer hold the allure that they do now. My life has veered quite certainly to the left since she and I 'broke up.' I am now much more conservative than I think she has ever sen me. Not that I have stopped being a bit of a rebel in all things, but I have calmed down. I don't throw parties like I used to, and I certainly don't drink like I used to. Going out to the bar to get wildly drunk has become a thing of the past. Something I only do on vacation. (Of course now that I'm pregnant, I won't be doing that AT ALL for what seems like forever) Of course, if she could see me now, she would say that I was lying. TO myself, to the world around me, and especially to her. She thinks I am capable of nothing but loving myself. Why she was able to cling to so much hope where a boy who was in and out her life so quick was concerned, but give up on me so quickly... I don't think I'll ever understand.
All of this I guess is really just back story. Recently, she posted that her friendships in the past were insubstantial. That all the friends she had "Before Shawn" had left her when she needed them the most. And that now that her life was improving, that her mood was getting better, they wanted back in. This struck a chord with me I guess, because as I sat obsessively reading every entry in her archives on that first day, I read about all her not-so-good days, and all the times she wished she had a friend that she could call in the middle of the night. And I sat there crying, wishing I could have been that friend. I felt so sad for her that she had finally found the 'partner in crime' she had wanted in Stacy, but had failed to find anyone she could wake while sobbing, and know that they would just sit quietly and listen to her, and try to talk her down, into being able to sleep - and failing that, would drive over in their pajamas, and stay up with her until she slept. I remembered all the nights so long ago when I lived with my boyfriend, and he and I would cancel our plans so she could come down and cry on both of our shoulders. And we would drop everything to make room for her in our lives, in our dates, and in our bed when necessary. I felt at that time in my life that I was truly helping someone who obviously needed it, and was the type of person who knew she had to help herself, and would, eventually be strong enough to do so. I felt at that time, that my support would help her get to that point.
Years later when she was pining for a boy she only recently gave up on and I could barely stand to hear his name, much less see all the pain that he brought on my sweetest girl, I failed her. I made the mistake of complaining to a friend I had had for years before her. I complained to him that I didn't want to face her depression. She found that email (through snooping) and it hurt her feelings. After that, things deteriorated quickly. I do not see myself needing to be in her life right now. It seems she has enough friends to keep her busy while she is on the upswing of her roller coaster. I had thought she could use me in her life when she needed someone who didn't mind losing sleep over her. The way I saw it, I was losing sleep over her anyway, so why not do it in a way that might help.
I don't know. I guess the whole point of this latter post is that Yes, I would like to be her friend. No, I do not fit into her life in any way right now. I don't have time for hanging out much, and I have a toddler that I couldn't bring over to her place with all her adult toys there, and I have no place for her to come to me to hang out either. I cannot go out and have fun with her on the weekends, and I cannot help her find new boys for her harem. Besides, I'm moving. I'm going to be very far away in a few months, so I will never really be able to insert myself into her crazy life again. However, i would like it if she could call me when she needs a friend. I still have and listen to the best friends CD she made for me one Christmas. On it is a James Taylor song (sung by some girl), the line goes "Just call out my name, and I'll be there, yes I will." and in once I am in Florida, I will be bale to stay up late on the phone if need be. I will not necessarily be able to drive over in my pajamas, but I can buy her a plane ticket to come down, and relax in the pool, or in the Gulf.
Have you ever been mad at being unfairly accused of feeling, or thinking, or being a certain way? Have you ever wanted the chance to defend yourself? I have wanted to show up on her doorstep for years, now. I wanted to show up on her doorstep, and tell her that I never would have moved out all those years ago, if I did not fear that it would end with Anal Ease in my toothpaste. And that now, looking back, taking even that punishment would have been acceptable if it could have showed her that I love her. that I would always be available to her. That it doesn't matter even now the time, and space that separates us, I still love her. And while I don't want to try to insert myself where I'm not wanted, I wish she'd at least let me be her friend... if only in email, and phone calls which is all I can offer right now.
Maybe I should just erase this whole entry. It'll probably do nothing but get me yelled at, and laughed at. But I can't help it. There's only a handful of people I've ever loved so much that I could allow them to hurt me. Only once has it been a boy. (excepting, of course, my son)
1:22 P.M. - Thursday, Mar. 15, 2007
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