It's been almost two years since I've seen my best friend from high school. When we last met, it was over twenty years of friendship that spanned many life changing events. If any of my friendships were to survive my transition, I would have thought that this would have been it. Sadly, this friendship was officially put to rest this morning.
As many of you may know, the last two years of my life have been tumultuous. Through those ups and downs I had offered several invitations to my friend but there were always reasons why they couldn't be accepted. I'm not one to read too deeply into things because sometimes people are busy, sometimes people actually do have valid reasons why they can't accept your invitation and sometimes it is just unfortunate that your events and theirs continue to clash several times in a row. It is too easy to come to false conclusions (and I have had many false claims levelled against me) and I am not about to make allegations against a friend without knowing the facts. Today, however, I received the facts from him. It is too hard for him to move on and as our lives have moved in different directions our friendship has come to an end.
I have mentioned, in previous posts, my thought processes regarding my transition and whether or not I should have told my friends or just left. Telling them is, I still believe, the right thing to do since I have acted with honesty and integrity. Whatever actions they all take is a testament to their character and not a weakness of mine. However, for all those in transition, be warned, it is a painful process and the pain continues far after all the physical aspects of transition are "complete".
What continues to astound me, is how people expect to resolve problems by staying away. As an ex-male I know that retreating into the man cave is a way of coping but it never actually resolves anything. With all relationships, contact (be it physical, verbal or virtual) is important. Distancing yourself from someone cannot somehow magically remove an issue so that your relationship will somehow become better again. An extended amount of time spent apart will only serve to spread the relationship further apart.
So, chalk up another scar and call it experience. I sometimes wish I didn't have to experience so much and I wonder how much I can take before I am totally enveloped in scar tissue and there is no heart left.
