Dreamer's World August 30 2015 - Reminders

We always find reminders of things at times when we least expect them. Today is one of those days for me. As I was relaxing on Sunday morning, I was going through my thousands of old photos when I ran across several that really struck me. I found 2 pictures of an old friend. We have not spoken in almost 6 months, and this is because he decided to terminate the friendship on his own.

I accepted his decision and made no effort to talk him out of it. When the phrase “I don’t think that we are friends anymore” and “You are no longer my friend” are used, there is not much that I could have done. More importantly, I chose not to care enough to try. As I have grown older, I find that I have no time for these juvenile antics.

That didn’t make discovering the pictures any easier. I was reminded of the times that w enjoyed each other’s company. I was reminded of the times when we promised to be there for one another. This made me sad for a brief moment, at least until I remembered the parting text messages listed above. I then remembered the things that drove us apart, mainly my lack of financial support for him when he hit tough times. I was going through my own tough times and could not help him.

He took this personally. That was his decision to make. He decided that apparently I was not the “friend” that he needed at that time. I accepted without comment and moved on. Realizing this made the decision to permanently delete those pictures much easier to proceed with. I would have done it anyway, but without the hindsight of my writing, where I had put down the things that happened between us I might have been tempted to attempt to reach out to him after all this time and see if things had changed and if he was doing better.

Reading through my old notes from that time convinced me that this would be a terrible idea. I was aware of my feelings at the time, but seeing the description of things that had happened presented back to me with clarity was the best thing that I could have hoped for!

I hope that my former friend is doing better now. I hope that he has found what he is looking for, and by that I mean that I hope that he finds the things that will get him out of whatever troubles he was in for good, and not just a temporary fix to the problems.

I still don’t bear him any ill will other than how he notified me of his decision via text like I was an employee or someone that he truly didn’t value. Again, I have handled that and have moved on. I made the choice based on his decision and I am at peace with it.

The pictures are deleted now. Sometimes, reminders start out in one direction and end up taking us somewhere else altogether.