Found myself wanting to lash out this week. A friend, a close, close, friend, didn't call me on my birthday. Or send a card. Or come by. Nothing. Nada. The silence was deafening, really.
So, I let it go for a few days and then found myself composing a "Dear Laura" letter in my head. It was going to be short, sweet and to the point: you aren't a good friend, you have become distant, and I don't wanna be your friend (do you hear the whining yet??). It felt good to get the anger out. Even if it was only in my head.
And then I had a thought. This woman watched my child being born. This woman was the one person, during a very difficult time at work, was the only one I could be assured of her loyalty and friendship. This woman and I had laughed, gaffawed, hooted, yelled and cried through so many amazing events. I love her like a sister. Just because my feelings were hurt because she had been neglecting our friendship since we had stopped working together, didn't mean that writing her out of my life was the thing that needed to be done. I had a little epiphany in my head - I needed to reach out to her with love, not with this anger that was due to hurt.
So, in her birthday card she got the most heart-felt letter I could write. I told her I wanted to reconnect, wanted our relationship to be close again.
The next day she called and came over with the card and present she had had on my birthday, but hadn't brought by or sent. We talked for a long time, and after she left, I found a letter to me in my card. It made me cry, and it proved to me, once again, that reacting from the worst part of myself, from pain and hurt, rarely gets me what I want.
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