A Sad Ending - Written In The Flavour of ‘Bitter Sweet’

Want to know what sucks? Learning the hard way that your friends are not really your friends. I've been mad at people in this book many times but this time might hurt the most. Losing a lover sucks and you'll cry a tonne but losing a friend is different. Your friends are the family you chose for yourself, the people you tell your secrets to and can be real in front of without judgement. Losing a friend is hard. 

Picture this, you, yourself are feeling good, looking absolutely gorgeous and headed to your work christmas party. It's Gatsby themed and everyone looks fabulous. It's a bittersweet celebration because you know you're resigning, they don't, but you know this is your last shindig with a team you've been working with for years. Some of those people have become really close friends and you can't wait to celebrate with them. The party starts off strong, you have a cocktail, everything is good. The second cocktail goes down just as well. There's a speech to recap the year and afterward the drinks start flowing a little faster as does the laughter. You have two more drinks and then black. Nothing. Nothing until you come to on a couch with a blanket over you. There's an ambulance and someone is taking your blood pressure. You're throwing up everywhere and the waitress is using your phone to call your sister. Your sister somehow convinces them to send you home and the next thing you remember is sitting at her kitchen bench talking about how your drink was spiked and all your colleagues, who at a bare minimum should have had a duty of care towards you, left you passed out in a bar in the middle of a city you don't live in. Luckily the staff at the venue called an ambulance because there's a very real chance that things may have taken a turn for the worse. Much much worse. I know that sounds dramatic and I'm known to be dramatic but there are many people who find themselves in that situation who aren't around to complain about it afterwards. 

The above is a true story and the unfortunate reality is that it is not loosely based on events but factually rewritten. My work mates and friends left me passed out in a bar after telling my sister that, and I quote, ‘wasn't doing well, we’ll keep you informed’. No further information was supplied and had she not called my boss she would never have found out that they were trying to pour me into an uber. To their credit, I think they did call an uber but at almost 2am after passing out but also still able to projectile vomit for 3hrs, the bar staff decided they should call an ambulance and thank the good lord they did. I come to laying on a couch mid spew (gross i know) with a bunch of paramedics surrounding me. The waitress was on the phone to my sister explaining that they had a duty of care to their patrons and couldn't put me in an uber. I remember saying “this seems excessive.” and not much else. I apparently spoke to my sister but after being told by my friends and coworkers that I was “just drunk.” She figured I'd be right to come home. The ambulance confirmed she was ok with them putting me in an uber and the next thing I remember is sitting at her kitchen bench watching her startled face saying “You're not drunk.” 

The next day not a single soul asked me how I was. I messaged my closest work mate, a person whom I considered to be one of my best friends, her response “good to see you're alive, I hated leaving you there.” How about next time your friend is passed out in a fucking bar, you dont leave them there. If that had been her daughter I think the response would have been wildly different. I understand that a bus had been hired to bring the team into town and it was leaving at 11pm and I was staying in town for the night when she wasn't but the difference between me and her is I would never have left her there. Ever, period!

I went overseas a few days later, with the rage and upset building. I had intended on having a conversation with my superiors and putting in my notice when I returned from holidays. I wanted to help with the transition of bringing on a new manager into a team and work place that I had spent years building. However after being left passed out in a fucking bar i decided they probably didnt deserve a face to face conversation and resigned via email while on holidays. It didn't go down well. Long story short, they asked me not to come back and said I couldn't start at the new place until after my notice period was up.

I learned the hard way that my friendships with these people were contingent on me working for them and that sucks. As much as I'd like to maintain the friendships, I have a feeling that if I don't put any energy into the relationships they will dissolve on their own. It's a most disappointing and immature end to what used to be a great working relationship but apparently that's all it was. So as bitter as the taste is in my mouth right now, I know after a tall cold glass of ‘fuck you all’ I wont taste it anymore.

Need To Change

And just like that awareness kicks in and they realise they need to change. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. It doesn't matter how many times you try to help a person unless they can recognise that the problem sits squarely on their shoulders, You will always be beating your head against a brick wall. Babe you are far too pretty to ruin the money maker for someone else's ignorance. However if you are lucky they might recognise a good thing and know that in order to keep you around they must change their ways. When the fear of losing you becomes stronger than the fear of being hurt they will try. I know everyone tells us not to wait for a person based on the potential you see but some people are worth waiting for and only you know this. If deep down you can feel the connection and you want to wait then do so. Don't let the societal ‘shoulds’ and ‘should nots’ tell you what to do. Don't let other people's opinions of what ‘should have happened by now’ change what you know. Only you know the connection you have with a person, you can talk about your experience and explain it as best as you can but you are the only person to experience it. You're the only person who really knows what's going on. And yes of course I'm talking about a boy, obviously. A silly boy who has my heart in his big dumb hands and knows it. He has always been gentle and kind with it but fear made him clumsy and sometimes he would poke it until I cried. I tried to take it back from him but he held on even when there was space between us and now I see him giving me his. It's a little bruised and battered and when you try to love it too hard it hides like a scared cat but he's trying. Sometimes he goes back to old habits and I have to accept that as part of the healing process. I'm no better. I spiral and catastrophise. I think the worst of him and vow to cut him off but to disappear, to take my love away without warning would make me the same as all the others. It makes me the same as those who kicked him in the guts in the past and I refuse to be another name on the list. In his round about way he told me he knows he needs to change and will impatiently wait and watch him change. I am his safe place and he is mine.

Whiplash - A Short Piece Written In The Style Of Maybe

So I honestly tried to say goodbye. I went as far as telling him I couldn't see him again, it was hard but I really tried. “We had fun” I said, meaning every word. At that moment in time I meant it. I had crashed out over him one too many times. I had been scraped up off the kitchen floor by caring friends one too many times but the time they asked if I loved him…

But two weeks later we were talking again. My secret shame, I can't stay away from him. We can't stay away from each other. I'm a dickhead for that man. 

We spent the weekend on the coast and I was nervous to see him until his hands were everywhere and the familiarity felt like home. But after catching up, I walked away thinking I was fine, like I was finally done, like it didn’t bother me if we were only ever going to be casual. I was wrong.

He came back different. After that weekend the vibe shifted. He came back more affectionate, more open and in his clumsy way I could see him trying to move forward. He took a job close to my home, he was coming to see me instead of the other way around, it felt like progress. But then, like the middle of any romance movie, everything fell apart. Everything got in the way of what should have been great. 

He blew the ass out of his car, ruined the tires on his motorbike and then was offered and took a really great job back home. I understand why he took it, I really do, but fuck the disappointment of not having him around for as long as I had hoped hit me hard. I think it hit him too. 

We were secure in the knowledge that we had a couple of months together, time to see each other more than once a month. Time to grow together to see if this thing that sits between us is worth the distance and then every test under the sun was put in the way. 

Then he shut down and the cycle began again. Following 20yr olds on social media, disappearing for multiple days and then coming back like nothing had happened. 

“Did you butt dial me?”

“no, but you don't want to talk”. 

And then without trying again, gone.

I've seen it before and I know enough about attachment styles to understand what's going on, not just with him but also in my reactions to his behaviour. My fear of being replaced by younger, hotter, closer to home burrows its way into my mind and eats me from the inside out. I pretend I don't care but I care. Fuck I care. Knowing what's happening doesn't make it easier, it doesn't make it hurt less. 

It's hard when he gets vulnerable, when we get close and then he runs from it. Runs to find freedom or distraction in something with no meaning. Maybe I read too much into it when you said you liked me? Please don't blur the lines between casual and caring when your words and actions make my heart skip a beat but the shut down makes my heart stop. Poetic

I have the patience to wait but how long do I wait for a man whose fear may be stronger than his ability to love? Maybe he might never have the capacity to fully let me in. 

Maybe I'll ask my tarot reader and she can give me the answers I need.