Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer,
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
-W.B. Yeats, "The Second Coming"
You're probably wondering why I picked these four lines to start out today's story. Seems pretty meaningful, doesn't it? You're probably thinking that what I'm going to tell you is something deep and serious. Well, I don't know exactly what I'm going to write yet, so it seems it's a mystery to everyone.
The only reason I know I didn't make Emily up is because there are pictures of us together since elementary school. Today, you would never be able to tell we used to be best friends. The talking is gone, the polite waves in the hall a distant memory. That's all we are to each other, a memory. You'd think half a decade of memories couldn't just be thrown in a box and put out to rot, but I've seen it in action. And let me tell you, anything rotten looks ugly.
I agree that can be very painful. As we make choices on what is important to us and the type of person we will be, our priorities change...which is fine (that's called growing up), but when others disregard those shared memories it feels very personal. But this is a tumultuous age when those huge changes are occuring. People are changing and becoming the essence of who they will be for the rest of their lives. Not that they won't continue to evolve and have new experiences, but the basic underpinnings of "who they are" get established (open/closed minded, accepting/judgmental, giving/selfish, etc). And so more and more, the friendships you are making (and keeping) now and into the future are based on those basic underpinnings. Some of those will become incredibly deep friendships that will last a lifetime and weather all sorts of storms. But I agree, that doesn't make the current feelings any less painful, just hopefully gives you hope and is a reason to keep your heart open.
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