How You've Grown

I have been far less diligent about it in recent years, but for a long time I’ve kept a journal –since my high school years. Since I just turned 32, that’s a lot of writing. I was going through a couple things in the basement and came across the box where I keep my old journals. I randomly pulled one out, and it was one that I started almost exactly 10 years ago. I flipped through it, pausing to read some passages more thoroughly, with this kind of detached feeling. It wasn’t that I felt as though I hadn’t been through everything I’d written about, but it just really felt like another life and another person. So much was different about me and my life, and it was really kind of interesting to read it from the perspective of my 10-years-older self. There were a few relationships that stood out (both capital “R” and small “r”), some of it made me sad, and some of it made me laugh out loud.

I had just finished college, and I was job-hunting. I finally found one and moved up to Cold Spring Harbor, NY, soon finding an apartment in nearby Huntington and settling in. Looking back, I am really glad that I made that move, even though it was completely outside my comfort zone, in about every way. I remember that feeling of isolation, the months and months of $200+ long distance bills, and the feeling that my life was 250 miles away from where I lived. But I also remember feeling like I got to know myself better at that time than any other, and I grew and changed more than would have been possible if I’d stayed somewhere safe and familiar. I essentially moved for the job, and I knew only one person in the area. A friend from college, or someone that I had thought was a friend. (Let’s call her Drama. Those of you who have known me since college may well know exactly who I’m talking about.)

I don’t know if the term “frenemies” had yet been coined, or if it was even really relevant to us, but reading my old journal, it was immediately clear to me just how toxic the friendship was – something I didn’t figure out soon enough. Drama and I got to know each other through an extracurricular activity we both participated in during college. She was very pretty and smart (probably still is both of those things, actually), wildly insecure, and could be…a little difficult sometimes. (I probably shouldn’t speculate on whether or not that’s still true.) But she was cool and we were friends.

Well, Drama invited me to a friend’s house for a 4^th of July weekend party. Having no better options in Long Island, a place chock full of young families where I knew absolutely no one my age or situation, I happily went along. I drove, because like all real Manhattanites, not only didn’t Drama have a car, I don’t know if she’d even driven one in years. We arrived at her friend’s house in CT and a very fun weekend of barbecuing, beer, and a jaunt out to see “Armageddon” in the theaters ensued. Over the course of this weekend, we both met the same guy – D. I thought he was kinda cute, and I also thought he was kinda flirting with me and I kinda liked it. He was a photographer, just starting out, with an unpaid internship for a very well-known celebrity photographer. He was smart and funny and a really interesting person. It was a fun weekend, and I was feeling good about myself.

Now, there are many details of the following events that I didn’t remember before perusing my journal, but I had always remembered the major points. The details made it even funnier – although at the time it wasn’t exactly funny to me.

Drama and I went to leave at the end of the weekend and he said something about seeing both of us later that night. I didn’t know what he was talking about, and Drama told me that he’d mentioned hanging out in NYC with us later. Because of the aforementioned flirting and good feelings, I thought that sounded like a *great* idea. So Drama and I went back to her apartment and hung out there. After a while, it was getting late, and with no word from D, I decided to head back to my place on Long Island. The next day, feeling somewhat girly and giddy, both in good ways, I asked Drama if she could give me D’s number. She ignored my first request, and then when I repeated it, said she’d look for it. A little time passed with no word on the subject from her, so I asked her again. She said she’d lost it.

I was pretty naïve and trusting at the age of 22. So I believed her.

But I wasn’t stupid. So I e-mailed her friend who had hosted the party, and asked her for D’s information. She happily gave it to me, and I called him. We talked for ages, and he asked me if I wanted to go out that Friday. I most definitely did, so I said yes. I made the mistake of mentioning this to Drama when she’d asked me to do something that Friday, and her immediate reply was:

“Well, that’s ironic because I’ve called him three times and he never called me back.”

Um…at the age of 22, I was pissed and hurt that she’d lied to me. At the age of 32, I think “that’s not ironic, that’s just sad.”

She then asked where we were going to be going so that she could come along.

I am not making this up. I also did not answer that question.

So she repeated it. And said that she could just add it to her e-mail signature if I kept not answering her.

I continued to not answer the question. I’d had no idea that she was even interested in him. And then I started to think back and realize that she had always seen me as the fat, ugly friend who made her feel better about herself. Because when we went out together, of course any guys we came across would be interested in her, I was just there to help introduce them. I remembered things like her saying, upon me describing what I thought was my cute new haircut “if you’re prettier than me now, I’ll be so upset!” Things like her mocking me and taking credit for things as silly as my flattering choice of makeup (which, incidentally, wasn’t true) in front of people.

So really, when you think about it, who would be interested in me? Well, as I had started to grow up, gain some self-confidence, and realize that I was neither fat nor ugly, it turned out that at least someone would be interested in me. She couldn’t take it. Of course it was ironic that he wanted to see me. And I started to not like her – an awkward situation since Drama was my only friend there.

D and I did go out that Friday night, alone, and we had a wonderful time. We went to a nice restaurant, he took me out dancing, and it was just fun. Fun had been distinctly lacking in most areas of my New York life to that point, so I was glad for the change. We talked and hung out until the very wee hours of the morning; I drove back to my apartment, and crawled into bed happy – replaying the events of the night in my head with a smile on my face as I drifted off to sleep.

The telephone rang at 7 am Saturday morning. It was Drama. Calling to inform me that our previously agreed-upon plans for the day weren’t going to work, but that she thought that, instead, it would be a good idea for me to come into the city to meet up with her and we could “go shopping for some hair things.”

Did I mention it was 7 am?

I said that if our original plans weren’t going to work, then maybe we should just reschedule for another day – I was kind of tired anyway. At which point she screeched into the phone “ What did you do last night???” I was taken aback at this reaction, stammered something about dinner and dancing (a friend later gave me a much better, and much funnier, suggestion of what I should have said – a crude reference to...er…nocturnal activities), at which point she said it was really crappy of me to ditch her because of some guy. I tried to say that I didn’t do any such thing, and that was basically the end of the call.

Now, some of my very kind older colleagues at my job gave me the same advice that a friend of mine at the time gave me – I had saved the e-mail for some reason. It read:

“I don’t want to sound harsh, but, um…THAT BITCH IS NOT YOUR FRIEND, DUMP HER IMMEDIATELY.”

I would actually tell myself that as well, if I could talk to myself 10 years ago. But at the time, it was all kind of convoluted because, you see, she was my only friend there. Perspective is everything.

This was probably my first lesson in how it’s better to be alone than be in an unhealthy relationship, whether you’re talking about a Relationship or a relationship. I didn’t really learn it the first time. Or for many times after that.

D and I saw each other a couple more times, talked on the phone a couple more times (wherein he apparently mentioned that Drama was not on his list of favorite people), and that was basically it. He moved frequently because he was going from overpriced sublet to overpriced sublet, and it just fizzled. I never really understood exactly why, but it was fine, in the end. I have always had a low tolerance for instability, and as much as I admired the dedication and commitment that made him something of a itinerant artist, it was one of many things that made it not meant to be.

Drama eventually began speaking to me again, although I’m baffled as to why I ever wanted her to. Probably because I really didn’t want her to be mad at me, I didn’t want to be alone – I don’t know the reasons. But they were somewhat doormat-ish.

It all finally really ended with Drama right before I ended up leaving Long Island, almost two years and many great friends and great experiences which hadn’t involved her later. We were hanging out one weekend, and she stole things from me. Really, truly stole things – an item of clothing that I had just purchased that she’d tried on as well and declined to purchase, and a couple other smaller things.

The last I heard from her was when I was in grad school. She IM’d me as I was sitting in my office, and mentioned something about coming out to Wisconsin to visit me. I didn’t respond. (I didn’t think I could afford to replace my stuff, for starters.)

I think that was my first official friend breakup. Not really my last, but it’s certainly the one that stands out. Upon reflection, upon reading all that stuff that was rattling around in my head and that made it to paper, I have to admit to some mixed feelings. There are parts that I think are hilarious because they’re so bizarre, and parts that make me a little sad because of how little I thought I deserved and how insecure she was. But it’s all in the past, either way. Thank goodness. I hope that she’s happier with herself and her life, and I know that I’m happier with my life.

But this is partly why I don’t understand people who say they wish they could be 21 again, knowing what they know now. I mean, there is something exciting about realizing all that you have ahead of you and how quickly it goes; it’s something that you really don’t truly appreciate until the years have already started to slip by faster than you can keep track of them. I don’t regret any of the choices I made – dumb, smart, cowardly or brave. They’re why I am who I am, and most days I like who I’ve become.

But good Lord, sheep learn faster than me. If I had to do all that crap again, I’d probably hit menopause before I’d find a healthy relationship.