My life as i remember

My life as i remember, a set on Flickr.

A brief look into my life. As it goes by, day by day. Curiosities, friends, myself, all from my trusty mobile phone.

Friendships can die, let go

It is very hard to move on from a friendship. Probably one of the hardest things you will ever do. Realizing that you and your friend(s) are now in different moments, feeling different things and totally off beat from you is painful. Really, really painful. You try to grab whatever memory, inside joke, anecdote, smile provoked, and still, nothing can bring you guys back. You can see the drift growing in between you, you feel it, every day. One less call, one more annoying thing you realize, one more heart breaking situation that you both can’t agree on. The time is here, let go. 

There’s always one moment in every ending friendship when one, or both of you, realize everything might be lost. You try to ignore it, you catalogue it as a temporary lapse, you look for answers and reasons and justifications. You fail, deep inside of you you know, you need to get away, whatever you were getting from that friendship is no longer there. You start to burn all the credits you earned for months or years or decades. You try calling more often, try to become a better friend, even date your friend in a desperate attempt to savage whatever’s left. You fail again. 

Another thing happens, your friend misses your big graduation party, or you miss that family wedding he asked you to come to. That time you just didn’t felt like missing that trip, or he wasn’t having fun so he left early. Back in the day you said it didn’t matter, your friendship is so much stronger than that, you could survive it all. But then those little details and absences start to accumulate. Suddenly it’s months since the last time you hung out together, and weeks since the last phone call. Eventually you stop considering him for whatever you plan, and he does the same. 

Slowly you both start disengaging from each other’s lives. What was once worth moving earth and sky for is no more. You have priorities and your old friend is no longer in the first positions of that list as before. Detachment starts, less and less pictures together, less Facebook comments, and as a thunder you realize you are making different plans with different people, you run into each other every now and then, probably genuinely still happy to do so, but differently. This time you just say hi and move on. This time you are not staying for the rest of the night around, you really move on.

Finally the last straw, you realize how you don’t like your friend anymore, what brought you together in the first place disappeared entirely, you are different people now. You actually realize you don’t wanna be around that old friend anymore, his values changed, or you changed, it doesn’t matter. The thing is nothing can be the same again. Either you moved on or he did, that’s life, us moving on. We move forward, its either that or die. The difference is the speed in how we do it, how fast can we get so far. It’s that difference that takes us people apart. 

It is neither good or bad, just a part of life. No resentments nor grievances. Just the way we humans are. It is a miracle when two people come together to keep each other company in their paths through life, but that company cannot last forever, at least not unchanged. We all come here to teach each other, but what we can teach is usually limited. Understanding and kindness can only go so far with some people, and that only works if you really want to try. If you feel that the entire effort is worth it. The thing is every day there’s less and less people willing to go the extra mile. 

Life-long friendships do happen, there’s hope for all of us. You just need to be watchful, thankful and kind. The rest usually sorts itself out. For the rest of us there’s only life and movement, it is what we can do, it is the best worst-case scenario we got. One thing is for sure, we will keep trying to find that company nevertheless.