The Fun Just Keeps On Leaving

I lost a friend this week. I had known him for over 26 years. We first met in high school, and we've been friends up until recently. There was an altercation between us over something stupid. At the time, I apologized, even though it wasn't my fault. I decided it was better to take the high road and accept responsibility for what happened, even though he started it. At the end, he said he accepted my apology, we hugged, and I thought we were cool.

I was mistaken.

He was angry enough after that evening to delete me as a friend on Facebook. This was, according to him, six months ago (though I remember him still being in my list of friends in December). Now he's not only angry about the altercation (in spite of my apology), he's angry it took me this long to notice that he had deleted me. I don't use Facebook that much, nor do I check my list of friends all the time to see if it has changed. Facebook does not notify you if someone drops you as a friend. I had a lot of other crap going on in my life, so the fact I hadn't seen him in a while wasn't uppermost in my mind. Still, I took the high road.

I apologized to him, without reservation or excuses, even though it was he who was being childish. I mean, he could have called me or e-mailed me to let me know he was still angry, and we could have tried to work things out like grownups. Instead he just avoided me like some chicken-shit kid. Still, even though I wasn't at fault, I took the high road for the sake of our friendship and apologized for the incident, for not contacting him, for not noticing he'd dropped me as a friend. Today I got a terse reply. He said "I would prefer it if we never interact again".

Just like that, 26 years of friendship gone, because he wouldn't talk to me, and was mad that I hadn't noticed that he was avoiding me. I guess we never were friends, if he can just end it that easily, over something stupid. It makes me sad.

My only consolation is that it really is his loss. I rarely say that, if ever. It's pretty clear in this blog that I don't have much respect for myself, so usually when something like this happens, I blame myself and fear that every friend will dump me because I suck. I thought about this particular friend, and realized that I'd been pretty good to him. I have driven him places (he lost his licence 20 years ago, and never got it back), including parties with other friends. I stuck up for him when some of my other friends didn't want him around. Three of my buddies' wives fucking hate his guts, and I sweet-talked them into letting him be a part of various festivities. I've stuck by him even as other people avoided him because of his alcoholism and his behaviour when drunk. I can honestly say I was a pretty good friend to him. I'm sad that he decided to end our friendship, but it's his loss. There are a lot of places he's not going to get invited to anymore.

I admit that I'm angry about why it ended, and how it ended, and his unwillingness to accept my apologies. I think it's unfair that he won't even give me a chance to make things up to him. There's a part of me that wants to kick the crap out of him if I ever see him. I probably won't - fist-fights are always counter-productive - but I'd like to. I guess it's because I feel betrayed. Plus, I've got a lot of other bad things going on, and I don't need this shit from some ungrateful bastard.

Shit like this sucks. Life fucking sucks. Days like today make me wonder why the fuck I bother.

No Value

My life apparently has value to other people. I am valued as an employee at work - my boss has given me good performance reviews and has stated more than once that things go more smoothly when I'm around. Some of my family members love me and enjoy my company. My friends like to have me around. When I spoke to one friend about how much worse my depression is these days, he said he would enjoy the world much more with me in it, than with me not in it. I can name many people who feel much the same way.

Oddly, though, my life has no value to me. It struck me as funny, in a sad way, that others enjoy my company, but I do not. I dislike myself, with ever-increasing intensity. I used to hide behind excuses for my miserable situation. After all, it's easier to deal with a world that's out to hurt me than it is to deal with the more painful truth that I'm the problem. An old Russian proverb says "It would be convenient for most people if God were a rascal". But if I'm honest with myself, and I strip away the illusions of Cruel Fate and an uncaring, or even malicious God, I see that the problem is me. I am the heart of my problems, the very black hole I seek to escape in vain. I am not lost in darkness, I am the darkness, and in the end, it is I who turned out the lights. That's why I hate myself, and that's why my life has no value to me. Other people may want me to live, but I don't, because I cannot stand the thought of thirty or forty more years of this self-inflicted misery.

My life has value to a lot of people, but sadly, I am not one of them.