During the two years that I was studying for my masters degree, I would meet two of my closest friends every Sunday morning at a local coffee shop. We’d spend an hour chatting, venting, gossiping, and catching up on our lives (or lack thereof) over bagels and coffee, before the conversations would inevitably tangent off onto random topics. I miss those chats – and the insights into my friends I’d gain through them. So I thought I’d try to restart something along those lines on my blog. A chance to hear more from my readers… at first, I was trying to decide if I wanted something consistent: quotes/sayings, song lyrics, random current or pop culture events…. But I think it will be more fun, more free to mix it up. Just whatever I’m dwelling on at the moment. Hope you all have as much fun with it as I do.
Don’t worry. I won’t ruin the movie for you. I WILL say that Toy Story 3 was hilarious. I enjoyed it the most of the 3. Added bonus: compare the improvement in animation from Toy Story 15 years ago to this one. Amazing. The premise of the movie – as determined from the TV ads and previews – is that as our darling Andy is going off to college, the toys are getting donated to a preschool. Here’s the other thing we learn: not all toys are created equal. Well, okay. They’re CREATED equal, but as they endure different lives they become very different. So do we.
So here’s my topic for today: Do you ever feel like the toys?
I do. I feel like my friends have moved on to the next phase of their lives and I’ve been left behind … and the most irritating part is that I feel like I should be waiting around for them to come to their senses and need me again… and I hate it. It makes me feel pathetic. That being said, does anybody blame the toys for waiting around? No. … but we don’t blame Andy for moving on to college either.
The concept of a disappearing friend syndrome (anyone know who came up with that phrase?) is not a new one. You will find mention of it all over the blogs, discussion boards, chat rooms and Twitter feeds.
The reasons for it are many fold, but when you really think about it they come down to 2 key points.
We don’t always make the most reliable friends. We often end up cancelling last minute – and that’s just the events we think we MIGHT be able to manage in the first place. Of course, we are not fully to blame. We obviously can’t help that we are ill. We should be able to rely on our friends. Isn’t that the whole point of friends?
Our friends don’t understand. So how do we fix this one? Well, we can’t fix it any more than we can fixt point one. There is only so much educating we can do. Even the amazing Spoon Theory can only go so far if people aren’t willing to listen.
Where does this leave us, you ask? Well, it leaves us exactly where we started. Except for one key fact – we, like the toys, have each other. As much as it often feels like are alone in the world having been abandoned by most of the people we hold near and dear, it’s easy to feel lost. I do. Even knowing that I have all of you, I still feel alone sometimes. Let’s face it, sometimes you want a flesh and blood friend… because I do honestly feel that not everyone has abandoned me because they can’t or won’t deal with the trials of an ill friend. I think some of them really just don’t get it.
So I ask you – what, if anything, has worked to help your friends to understand?
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