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- Newsgroups: alt.angst
- Path: sparky!uunet!pilchuck!mdisea!rudoff
- From: rudoff@mdd.comm.mot.com (Doug Rudoff)
- Subject: Re: Angstlet
- Message-ID: <1993Jan27.192113.6635@mdd.comm.mot.com>
- Sender: news@mdd.comm.mot.com
- Organization: Motorola, Mobile Data Division - Seattle, WA
- References: <1993Jan25.144224.28087@spectrum.xerox.com>
- Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 19:21:13 GMT
- Lines: 82
-
- In article <1993Jan25.144224.28087@spectrum.xerox.com> eradm@wbst845e.xerox.com writes:
- [Tale of being dumped by the pretending-you-don't-exist method]
-
- I have my own tale to spin on this subject. It tore me up at the time,
- but looking back at it, it's funny in a sad ironic way. And I learned
- a lot in the process.
-
- A year and a half ago I had a female friend who I did things with
- fairly often. One of the things I liked about her and had respect for
- was her straightforwardness. It was defintely only a platonic
- relationship and I was quite comfortable with that ... until ... I
- fell in love with her. And I knew she didn't feel the same way.
-
- I never told her my feelings for her, but I'm sure it was obvious. And
- her response was to cut off contact with me entirely. I agonized for
- weeks over my non-returned phone calls. The last time I called her
- number had been changed; she had moved. A few months before when I
- moved she was the first of my friends to offer to help me move. The
- irony didn't escape me. I felt like she decided to be purposefully
- cruel to me by leaving things hanging. Which I'm sure was not the
- case; it's just easier for some people not to confront a hard issue to
- discuss.
-
- I felt as if I did some unknown horrible thing to her (which for her
- maybe falling in love with her was).
-
- One of the hardest things to get over was that I has this false
- expectation that she would have no problem in being honest with me.
- Especially since she had been always upfront with me before. But she
- couldn't when emotions were involved.
-
- In hindsight her decision to break things off was right, I just wish
- she had enough fortitude and compassion to simply tell me, "Doug, I
- don't think we should do things together anymore."
-
- A few months later I tried to reconcile with her when I had I gotten
- over her (Really! I had just started a new relationship - that didn't
- work) and I knew I had no ulterior motives. We talked (but not about
- what had happened between us) and since she had some books of mine we
- agreed to meet for a beer when I returned from a two week vacation. I
- felt great about taking a friendship that went bad and rebuilding it.
-
- Two weeks later I left a message on her answering machine. Two days
- later my books arrived in the mail with a note saying, "Here are you
- books." That's all. I wondered why she forgot the "Fuck off and die"
- in her note.
-
- We crossed paths a few months later at an outdoor concert. She saw me
- and went the other way. It just seemed sad to me.
-
- But, I only know my side of the story, not hers.
-
- Despite the angst the whole experience caused, I learned a lot.
- Certainly, nothing like this will happen again to me if I can avoid it
- (if it does I'd be a complete idiot). And what I learned has already
- many times stregthened my friendships and relationships with other
- people.
-
- The moral of the story is:
-
- - If you're going to break up with someone, it's going to hurt him/her
- no matter what you do. But at least tell him/her. Do it with
- compassion, honesty and don't delay it.
-
- - Some people can't deal with being honest when a relationship
- falters.
-
- - If there are doubts about the nature of a relationship, do not let
- things go unsaid. (The last time we got together, I knew something was
- wrong, but was afraid to bring it up.)
-
- - If you ever have an unrequited love for someone hope you have the
- strength to break things off yourself.
-
- - Not all broken friendships/relationships can be fixed.
-
- - [Add your own moral here]
- --
- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
- Doug Rudoff Motorola, Seattle INTERNET:rudoff@mdd.comm.mot.com
- USENET:uunet!mdisea!rudoff
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