On Staying In Touch

[habitual_loser]

Here I am approaching.... 5 years since my breakup with an ex, and being a contemplative schmuck...

 

Being friends after a breakup is hard to do. It hasn't worked for my in two of my other relationships, but for this one...

 

Let's just say that she's got an incredible talent at picking up exactly where things left off with people. People she hasn't seen for two years - disarmed with a smile and energy that just seems to come out of nowhere. A breakup that left me depressed, possibly suicidal, and certainly not ready to hear she was engaged less than 3 months after the breakup - even when I have tried being working up some anger about that, it honestly just can't hold up to that disarming smile. I mention this because I want to impress upon you the unique vitality of the woman. She was one of those rare people out there who really enrich the lives of everyone they touch, even if it's just in passing. You'll meet a few of them in your life, if you're lucky, and if you're really lucky, she'll reshape your universe.

 

Some people have way too much hold over your life - maybe you still love her, maybe you don't - but would you rather have them out of it completely? A witty email every few months, a couple hours of frisbee once a year, and a sore thumb for a week were all I've really gotten out of my attempt to stay friends with her until a couple days ago I got an invitation to her wedding.

 

I felt really conflicted about that over the past couple days - I've gone from pain to anger (for the first time in ages), resignation to admiration, to all-around warm+fuzzies, and back again. All over the rather limited emotional landscape I've got, visiting most of the interesting attractions more than once.

 

That wedding invitation has a meaning, and it's very simple. _She_ wants me there - whether she thinks that it'll provide me with the closure I really could have used 5 years ago, or whether I'm important enough to her that knowing she has my approval is worth making her fiance extroardinarily uncomfortable, especially when the I'm so obviously still hung up over her, or whether it's for some unfathomable and uniquely female reason.

 

It's worth a lifetime of sore thumbs.

 

So here's to the brave fools like me, who've been burnt but still invest their good will and admiration in the people who did it to them. Maybe it's selfish and ultimately harmful, but once in a while, something uniquely painful and bittersweet comes around and makes all the pain of staying in touch - even if it's only in small quantities - completely worth it.

 

So too, to friendship and the strange ways we honor and affect each other.

 

Now if only she'd ditch the bozo and profess her undying love to me. (Relax, I'm joking. Well, half-joking anyhow, which is unfortunately as good as it gets.)

[stolenshadow]

Hello, I'm not sure you want advice on this but here it goes just the same

 

You know you love her, you know you have her on a pedestal and a part of you knows she's not great or special but you have put her so high up that you wish the world could see her in the same way.

It seems to me you also feel anything from her is better than nothing, why?, why wouldn't you deserve the most marevellous woman to love you and give you her time, her smile every day and get married to you?.

 

Being in touch with the ex is not bad if you no longer want them back for a love relationship, this is not the case, why?, because all you are getting back is exactly the same thing that is hurting you.

 

I think this woman is not a good person, I think for no reason you should attend her wedding but I know it's your decision to finally accept to end it or carry on for a few more years, maybe until she has a baby, divorces, and finds another guy.

 

It's up to you, but I would say you're too important to just sit there and watch.