It's been a year now since I got heartbroken. I've been having nightmares since last May. The odd thing is that nothing inside me shattered, but the heartbreak was the result of the end of a friendship that had been doomed from the start. This is what Pauline Boss calls 'ambiguous loss' - something gone, not necessarily good, nor bad, but suddenly ripped out of my life, without an equivalent replacement. Weirdly enough, around the same time, I began a long-term committed relationship, a bond whose strength overshadowed many of the friendships I have had in my life. But still. Nothing to replace that old, rugged friendship, a co-existence of necessity, shaped through attachment and gossip and hypothetical futures that we tied together to make up the myth that may support the relationship of two people who fundamentally are not meant to like one another.
My memory of how it all began is blurry. A lifetime ago, a frozen pizza in a dirty student hall, immediate disconnection. Then, years later, a random reaching out. An offer. Acceptance. Anxiety. Gradually getting acquainted. Then, a strange melting together in the face of circumstances not easily mitigated. Perhaps I never felt more Gen Z than in our disagreements about the end of the world and our desperate jealousies of better possibilities. In the end, we lacked substance. Though fascinating, debating our differences began to feel like bickering. There was no major change on either side. Even now, I am less than sure to what extent conflict in friendship should be addressed, rather than merely acknowledged. Conventional wisdom encourages argument until common ground is found, but giving each other space and acceptance seems more ethical. This remains an open question. There is a lesson learned, too, though, regarding the nature of our break-up. Despite being thoroughly superficial, our clash was caused by conflicting principles. They valued loyalty; I valued candour. We could have seen it coming. And, in a way, we did.
Friendships rarely tend to end in a bang. Often, they fizzle out. Messages get fewer, meet-ups only happen once in a blue moon, birthdays get forgotten. We tried to stop that inevitable decline, but it did not work. Once everything had been said that would not anger the other person, we were only left with trivialities, nostalgia, and forced conversation. One hour per week, our residual sense of connection slowly killed itself. The end was sudden and hurtful, though it was the direct result of a shift in priorities. It was the right decision for both of us. Perhaps I was too prideful to consider that long-term distance might be healthiest for us both. Having seen many of my friends' friendships come to a sudden halt, I was happy to be the one holding on the longest, more than was good for either of us. Admittedly, I enjoyed our artificial intimacy - the atomic power of difference held together by sheer will - and was not going to let go. But in a way that power was potential, which, since then, has propelled us forward.
For a long time, it was strange to avoid them. Hoping I would not run into them at their work. Though after a couple of weeks of rare silence, it was good to see they were still around. This strange circumstance certainly impaired me, having to go out of my way to let my friend have theirs. There was some jealousy in wanting to hear how they got on, whether they were doing okay. Some schadenfreude, too, when they failed. I always thought that once I considered someone my friend, they would always remain one. Was I wrong? The photo on my fridge still has a photo of the two of us. I chose not to take it down, but to prevent unnecessary animosity (with myself), a sticker covers their face. Careless hiding of the past behind, a fruit label peeled off an apple. In a way, it is a way of coping with the ambiguous loss. Acknowledging that they are still there, somehow, a memory just filtered ever so slightly to milden the sting of the splintering. A few weeks ago, an ironic turn of fate led me to meet my friend again. I have never felt anything like it.
We were respectfully nice to each other, acknowledging each other's respectful wishes. There was subtle intimacy and playful allusions of aggression; resentment was either buried or absent. We presented ourselves as strangers with a past. Of course, there remains much ambiguity inherent to this experience, but I finally also feel like I did not let myself down. We are capable of expressing goodwill as if our friendship were yet to begin. I can appreciate how they have benefitted me, as I have benefitted them, and celebrate their successes, which I once actively tried to support. Strangely, it feels like a victory against each other's and other people's expectations. Moving on, but still seeing each other, being aware of each other's presence, but not interfering. Co-existing in the absence. And now that this chapter of uncertain transition has passed, it has opened for me some intriguing questions about how we treat relationships of different kinds, what freedom in friendship means, to what extent we should consciously craft bonds to other people, and what solidarity might mean.