Letting go

[mrissa]

Earlier in this week, one of the people on my friendslist (locked post) asked about letting go of people if you realize that your feelings are not reciprocated. How do you do it? she asked. At the time, I said you don't so much do it as realize that you have done it sometime in the past; you live through it until you aren't thinking of it as much, and then eventually when you think of it, it doesn't hurt any more, however long that takes.

I found my lost Wilburys CD this week, and with it I had the realization that this has happened for me: not with a romantic relationship, as the locked post implied, but with a friendship. One person and I had different ideas of what trust and friendship meant, and I was very hurt to find that out. But it was years ago now, and the song on this CD that very specifically associates with this person isn't bittersweet any more. I smile at the memory, and the smile doesn't twist, and my heart doesn't twist, either. I've always been friendly with this person -- so different from being friends! -- so it's never an issue of knowing I could be civil. And I still wouldn't confide anything of any depth in this person without significant time rebuilding a friendship, if then. But when I think of him doing something fun, silly, funny, I can smile. I can value the things that made us friends to begin with, without being blinkered about the things that ended the friendship.

This is a good thing.

Comments

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It's "Wilbury Twist," too, so it should be pure joy. And now it is again.

Glad it was a good thing.