"We seem to have reached the age where life stops giving us things and starts taking them away."
I really wanted to open this blog with a quote from a much-loved, classic film. Unfortunately, we have this one from Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
Having recently re-watched the fourth instalment in the Indy saga I can confirm it hasn’t improved with age, but this quote certainly resonates with me far more than it did in 2008.
As mentioned in my previous blog, I lost my parents within 15 days of each other in February/March of this year. Obviously I understand that the death of your parents is the natural order of things, but it hits especially hard when you haven’t begun to process the death of one before the other follows. The fact that my dad was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s when my mum was already in the later stages of the disease just seemed too cruel for words. You lose them when their mind disintegrates then you lose them again when they die. It's not an experience I'd wish on my worst enemy.
People may think I'm now ok because I say I'm ok or I post amusing anecdotes on Facebook. However, as My Chemical Romance once said; "I'm not okay (I promise)" and humour is simply my well-worn coping mechanism. Life just hasn't given me the breathing space to be ok. There's rent to pay, a car to repair, debt to repay and one extremely big mouth to feed. Oh, and I also need to feed the dog (ho-ho).
My former manager knew I wasn't ok when I had a bit of a meltdown at work, but it's perfectly ok to not be ok. In this messed up world who can really say they're ok anyway?
Ok, maybe those guys are ok... but I digress. I have two consecutive days off next week, so maybe that will help.
In this blog I mostly want to focus on the good friends who support you during times of need – and those who just go off the grid. I’m sure we all have people in our lives who are about as supportive as a misogynist at a women's football match.
I’ll also touch upon the “quiet quitters” who start ignoring your texts for days, then weeks… until, finally, when you eventually tire of constantly being ignored [and the terrible excuses for not wishing to hang out] you decide to step away. Sometimes you have to step away from friendships – for your own sanity. Yet ask them why we haven’t met up for a while they’d most likely say “Oh, I haven’t heard from David for a while” or “I don’t know, it seemed to fizzle out”
Yeah, strange that. I wonder why…
Likewise, a bottle of Dr Pepper is likely to fizzle out if you stick it in the cupboard for several months and forget about it.
Having listened to a lot of true crime podcasts this year I know there are people in this world who crank the psychopath dial up to number 11. Real nasty monsters. Personally, I’ve never met anyone who takes that dial beyond 5 or 6, but every human is uniquely different. People have called me "quiet and gentle" but I’m possibly a 7 on the psychopath dial if I experience slow broadband when I’m in deadline mode.
We all have our own coping mechanisms for getting through life. I’ve known narcissists, sociopaths, gossips, dark empaths and people who use others for their own personal gain. I’ve even called some of them my friends. It doesn’t make them unlikable, and it doesn’t make them evil – but I have begun to distance myself from toxic people or those who can clearly take me or leave me.
Some time ago I made a conscious decision to distance myself from a few gossipmongers. One person in particular started spreading half-baked misinformation about my financial situation. Although I endorse talking to a friend if I have a genuine concern for a mutual friend I have to say this was very different. This was definitely more a case of malicious gossip with devious intent. I’m not going to expand on this right now as it’s a deep dive blog for another time. It's just an example of when one should tell a friend to "get in the sea" so to speak.
It goes without saying that I couldn’t have got through the last 12 months without the love and support of my good friends and family. Even my parents’ friends or neighbours who offered to take care of Luna at 3am. I mean, that’s a real hardcore offering of help right there. Each and every person who reached out with messages and cards of condolence really restored my faith in humanity.
Well, most of humanity.
On the flip-side of the overwhelming love and support I received there were one or two individuals who really made me re-evaluate our friendships and force me to question, just why [prior to all of this] I’d invested so much time and devotion to them.
It may be a weary old cliche, but you really do learn who your friends are during troubled times. When your life is about to crash and burn you have those who offer you a parachute and those who hit the ejector seat button to get the hell out of the situation ASAP. The meme where Homer Simpson slowly retreats backwards into a hedge also springs to mind.
I'm not going to name names and I'll completely ignore anyone who asks for names as that's just not fair. However, I will share an example of when to let go of individuals who are clearly quite indifferent towards you.
I texted a close friend last December, initially saying my Dad had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and I felt pretty devastated. I wasn’t fishing for any kind of sympathy, but perhaps I needed some basic human empathy. It certainly wasn’t something I wanted to share on Facebook at that time, I just felt my closest friends should know. Especially when we’d chatted about my parents – and my fears for them – on numerous occasions.
A few days passed and I hadn’t received a reply, which struck me as a bit odd. Although, to be fair, my messages were being left “unread” for several days more and more frequently.
Okay, you noticed that red flag? Well spotted, Columbo.
Yes, in hindsight that’s always a warning sign in friendships. If someone is leaving your messages unread for days on end – like an unwanted piece of junk about a courier failing to deliver your parcel [when you hadn’t even ordered a parcel] it can be disconcerting. Sure, we all forget to reply occasionally [guilty as charged] but I can’t imagine just completely ignoring an important message for several days. Especially when your friend moans about people who do it to them.
I'm sure we've all read a message and become distracted, then it's suddenly two weeks later and we feel that ship has sailed – but this was different. It was a noticeable deterioration of communication over a short period of time.
“Quiet quitting” usually refers to doing the minimum requirements of one’s job, but the term has also been attributed to relationships. For example, a friend starts ignoring you for a day, two days, three days, seven days… until they eventually ignore you for weeks or months. It avoids confrontation or that awkward conversation of “Actually, I don’t really want to spend time with you anymore.”
Equally, it's not fair on them for you to continue messaging if they constantly ignore you. They don't owe you an explanation for not wishing to communicate anymore. A friend should never become a hostage and sometimes no message is a message.
Have you ever sat in a pub with a self-confessed “rubbish texter” who’s texting one of their friends despite always leaving you hanging for days? Well, it’s a tad ironic but they are actually sending you a message too. Albeit indirectly.
Anyway, back to the story…
Almost two weeks after texting my friend I received a very brief text on Christmas Day wishing me and the family a Happy Christmas. It was pleasant and nice enough, yet it completely disregarded everything I’d written in my previous message. There was none of the things a close friend would normally say when you deliver tragic news, like “Sorry to hear that” or the classic “Let me know if you need anything” or variations thereof. This very generic text could easily have been a “copy and paste job” or something you’d send to a distant cousin you haven’t seen for ten years.
Still, at least it was a message. I’m not one of these ungrateful souls who receive a Christmas card and say “It’s a bloody Moonpig! I want them to go and queue in shop to buy a card! I also want a lengthy handwritten message with a stash of money, a box of chocolates and a bottle of wine because life is all about me!!”
I don’t suffer with “main character syndrome” and life isn’t all about me. The text message was fine, it just seemed a bit off – and a complete contrast to more affable and personable messages I’d received in the past from the same person. Had they been abducted? Was someone pretending to be them?
Maybe I just listen to far too many true crime podcasts, but when someone slowly switches character like that the alarm bells start ringing. Just six months prior to this I’d texted them to say I was off work with a bad neck. I expected nothing but this same friend offered to pop over if I needed anything. That’s quite a quantum leap over such a short period of time.
Again, just after Christmas I informed my friend that both my parents had now been admitted to hospital.
Again, nothing.
I can’t say why I thought my former close friend would care, but I feel it’s basic human empathy to respond with something in such circumstances. Anything. Even some kind of sad face emoji. I mean, a bit inappropriate, but something…
Now feeling a tad concerned I asked if they were okay and, of the few responses I did receive, they were just busy with social events and general “life admin”. I’m not entirely sure what "life admin" involves, but it seems to be an excuse people use to avoid social situations.
I'm definitely stealing that one.
Word on the street was they were out socialising and actually completely fine. I also did some detective work (hence my moniker of DC Hill) and yep, they seemed fine. Just a bit distant I guess. A third party informed them of my parents’ passing as, by this point, I realised that texting them with this news was pretty much pointless. For the sake of my own mental health, there had to be a cut off point.
This doesn’t make them a bad or terrible person I hasten to add. While some people tick several boxes on the narcissism checklist I do understand that others simply don’t know how to respond to difficult situations so they simply go off the grid until things blow over – or forever. It’s a lot easier than faking concern or offering kind words if you don’t really mean them. Credit where it’s due – sometimes it’s best to say nothing if you feel nothing.
I'd say it's bordering on the impossible for me to spend quality time with certain individuals again. Some people are only meant to be in your life for a season. Whereas others are there your entire life, even if you do only meet up every 5 or 10 years.
I feel that Past David (the David of 2023) wouldn’t have had the strength to say “This person can clearly take me or leave me so I’ll let them go”. I’d have just persisted with being the instigator of 9/10 of our meetings and continued accepting the ignored messages or excuses for not wanting to meet up without question.
The David of 2024 is a very different beast. Possibly more cynical but also much more direct. I don't suffer fools and if someone lies to me I'll always call them out.
While I’m acutely aware that I will never see one or two of my friends ever again, I’m strangely fine with it. Whereas had I been told that a year ago I’d have been completely devastated. In a weird way it’s like an extension of the grief I was already suffering. The absent friends aren't dead to me in a malicious sense, but more of a healthy sense – if that even makes sense?
The question is; how can one possibly sit in a pub and share a drink with someone who has no interest or care for one’s life whatsoever?
The answer, as painful as it may be, is… one cannot. You cannot single-handedly keep a friendship alive if the other person has no real enthusiasm for that friendship anymore. Let them "sail away", as Enya once said. Sometimes it takes a tragic series of events to make you re-evaluate your entire life and the people you choose to share that journey with you. Life is too short for drama, lies, nonsense, and people who can take you or leave you when the chips are down.
Yes, it’s been the worst chapter of my life. My parents are both gone, one or two people I thought of as close friends are gone. Even Beatrice, my bloody car, is currently AWOL. She’s been at the garage for almost a month, having failed the MOT in quite costly fashion. I won't be seeing her again until January or February pay day.
Thank God I still have Luna.
*Goes to check Luna hasn’t died as she’s suspiciously quiet upstairs
Yeah, she’s fine.
Despite life taking a lot of things away… there are still good memories to be made in the future. Sometimes you just need to wrap a friendship when you know the best days have gone, but you can still appreciate the memories of that [now defunct] friendship.
You don’t need to keep waiting for replies, they don’t need to keep ignoring you or dreaming up excuses for not spending time with you anymore. It’s win/win. I’d go as far to say it’s quite liberating. Sometimes it’s just not a good idea to reignite something when you know the best days are gone. Which, fittingly, leads us back to the Indiana Jones franchise.
I still love the first three films and nothing will change that. The fourth or fifth films haven’t “ruined” the first three as they still exist in their entirely, and nobody can take my enjoyment of those films away from me.
I’ll leave you with one of my favourite quotes from Samuel Beckett (the writer, not the protagonist from Quantum Leap)
"Perhaps my best years are gone. When there was a chance of happiness. But I wouldn't want them back. Not with the fire in me now."
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