To my dearest friend,
I like to bitch about the people who hurt me, under my breath. I like to hold onto it like a bad habit, like I hold onto my own mistakes, replaying them well after the decade mark with the usual twinge of remorse. I am the same, only older and wiser. I should talk about what I sincerely regret because twenty three years later, it still hurts. By the cold way I cut off our friendship, you'd never know just how sorry I am, my actions gave me a life sentence where I can never forgive myself for letting you go, sending you away, you, irreplaceable, priceless, a terrible ridiculous loss. Born out of stubbornness, inability to cope with the new reality, I made it so irretrievable. It's lost for life. We are here to learn but it was a lesson that will burn me all the way to my dying day. I couldn't handle your boyfriend's wandering eye, the way he was able to seduce girls in our very own circle and get away with it. Yet you are still married to him, this greasy sneaky man who never deserved you, who I can't imagine has been faithful to you. But you are so trusting, forgiving, unconditionally loving. The night I saw you at our favorite hangout, a weekend you came to visit after your graduation, I noticed how some girl I worked with dramatically made an exit. She was upset you were there because your man was spending a lot of time wooing her. I guess he was successful because she was devastated. I wanted to tell you but we were already estranged and he could explain it away like he explained it away before when I became the bad guy for telling you what was going on. I stayed away because I couldn't mentally handle it, but that also meant losing my best friend. Thanks to Facebook, I can see your marriage is still going strong two decades later while mine is struggling. So what did I know? I could learn a thing or two from you, about forgiveness especially. I thought about you during my wedding reception, standing on the dance floor while others danced around me, a moment of sorrow because you were not there, and many other occasions where I can almost imagine your smiling perky self sitting next to me, sharing in the moment. I made myself suffer for this, wondering how badly I hurt you, when that was what I precisely wanted to do. My suffering is indeed longer because it continues. I never would be able to scrape together enough moxi to tell you because I fear the same rejection I gave you twenty three years ago when I was twenty three. I wouldn't want to know that it hardly mattered to you anymore. I hold onto the memory of what we were at the time and I am grateful you were my friend at all, and perhaps some day I can stop kicking myself for screwing that up. I can't climb that mountain to try and grasp at what appears so out of reach. I caused that. I can't change that and I'm sorry. I've made a few mistakes over the years that give me pause when I recall them. This is one of them. It's a gut tightening cringe. It's instant sadness. It's a bigger heartbreak than any breakup with past lovers or any other friends who have come and gone. I'm sure you are a bright spot in people's lives, you are truly a special person and I will be eternally glad we were friends.
Love you Mare
