Trying to keep up friendship
Jan. 13th, 2004 11:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhialtoA letter:
Hi T.! This was one of those weekends with interesting things, those things that I thought "I should tell T. about them". But I wasn't sure if I should do it - given our new situation.
But first, I am half-watching some weird horrible American tv programme called "Are you hot?" which seems to be a tv version of the website "AmIHotOrNot" (which is now www.hotornot.com). Lots of men and women are judged on their looks and sex appeal. Of course, there are lots of stereotypes (and almost none of the men are interesting, of course).
So this weekend there was the LNBi newyears-reception in a neighbourhood café in Tilburg. I was planning to catch the last train back home, but fortunately I got a place to sleep, almost in the last minute. That was very nice, because this way I could see the band which was coming (but they arrived an hour later than expected). They were called Malavita and they played "Latin Ska" or "Salsa with Ska and Punk", or something like that. Whatever the description, they were really great and I danced a lot (with several other people). When they were finished, I was really exhausted. And the band liked our enthousiasm too :) I wanted to buy a cd or something from them, but they didn't bring any and they had to make more anyway, so I gave them my address, and I mentioned the Samba-Punk band Bloco Vomit from Edinburgh, because they might like it. After the band the normal disc-jockey took over and played some of the most horrible (and sexist!) dutch songs... no doubt under the pressure from the "normal visitors" of the café.
On sunday I went to see Lord Of The Rings again, with [a collegue who I fancy somewhat], her boyfriend and another friend (the one who invented the word "beurtbalkje" (the thing in the supermarket between your groceries and those of the next customer)). Even though I had seen it before it was still impressive again. And near the end, after the ring was destroyed and everybody was saying goodbye, (you did see the film by now?), and when Frodo was suddenly and unexpectedly leaving in that ship... I felt the memory of tradition, and I felt like you were Frodo and I was Sam... *sniff*
I wanted to end with something positive, but this is the chronological order. I hope you still enjoy reading this. I just wanted to tell somebody :-)
Hi T.! This was one of those weekends with interesting things, those things that I thought "I should tell T. about them". But I wasn't sure if I should do it - given our new situation.
But first, I am half-watching some weird horrible American tv programme called "Are you hot?" which seems to be a tv version of the website "AmIHotOrNot" (which is now www.hotornot.com). Lots of men and women are judged on their looks and sex appeal. Of course, there are lots of stereotypes (and almost none of the men are interesting, of course).
So this weekend there was the LNBi newyears-reception in a neighbourhood café in Tilburg. I was planning to catch the last train back home, but fortunately I got a place to sleep, almost in the last minute. That was very nice, because this way I could see the band which was coming (but they arrived an hour later than expected). They were called Malavita and they played "Latin Ska" or "Salsa with Ska and Punk", or something like that. Whatever the description, they were really great and I danced a lot (with several other people). When they were finished, I was really exhausted. And the band liked our enthousiasm too :) I wanted to buy a cd or something from them, but they didn't bring any and they had to make more anyway, so I gave them my address, and I mentioned the Samba-Punk band Bloco Vomit from Edinburgh, because they might like it. After the band the normal disc-jockey took over and played some of the most horrible (and sexist!) dutch songs... no doubt under the pressure from the "normal visitors" of the café.
On sunday I went to see Lord Of The Rings again, with [a collegue who I fancy somewhat], her boyfriend and another friend (the one who invented the word "beurtbalkje" (the thing in the supermarket between your groceries and those of the next customer)). Even though I had seen it before it was still impressive again. And near the end, after the ring was destroyed and everybody was saying goodbye, (you did see the film by now?), and when Frodo was suddenly and unexpectedly leaving in that ship... I felt the memory of tradition, and I felt like you were Frodo and I was Sam... *sniff*
I wanted to end with something positive, but this is the chronological order. I hope you still enjoy reading this. I just wanted to tell somebody :-)
unexpected endings
Date: 2004-01-27 06:12 am (UTC)I already heard the dreadful story of T. breaking up unexpectedly from Adri, who talked with you on the LNBI new years party @ Tilburg.
I must say that hearing things like this still give me an enormous shock! I Can't imagine why somebody ends a relation just by phone or email. It is beyond even the most basic form of decency to do so!
Instead of discussing the problems in a relationship when they appear, so that problems can be either solved, or one can come to the conclusion that it's better to end the relationship TOGETHER. When you have started a relationship together, one should try to finish it together too, or at least make an attempt for that.
I've been talking a lot with people about this subject recently, and I have heard the most dreadful stories about how people ended up a relationship.
When this happened to me a year ago I was totally wrecked, it felt almost like the person had died unexpectedly. There were so many questions left, and someone not willing to talk about what had happened made it very hard. The only way to get out was to go through the cruel process of killing all the love I ever felt for this person, forgetting all the nice memories of the many things we have shared. Something that I hate! Because I want to stand in life as a honest person, not only to other, but also to myself. I want to recognize the people and things that were(or are) important to me and now I had to almost entirely kill the memories of something that was very dear to me, just out of self defence.
This kind of behavior doesn't make the world any better. After a period of total anger at so much stupidity, I now moved ore towards feeling sorry for this person, having so little emotional and social skills to handle the basics of relationships.
Well one thing can help a little bit: music!
The lyrics of my weird blues band project I'm leading at the moment helped me at least with the anger phase.
if I had possession
over judgment day
Lord, the little woman I'm lovin' wouldn't
have no right to pray
Robert Johnson. And not to speak about the lyrics of JL Hooker's Mad Man Blues!
Also Schubert's Winterreise in the Dutch translation of Jan Rot helped me a lot:
Ik lijd en jij verveelt je,
Mijn liefje goedenacht!
So: Nothing compares 2U is a good start! But some anger might help too...
Hugs (see: http://community.webshots.com/photo/104711479/104722231gmCZPs), and a lot of strength!
Luc
Re: unexpected endings
Date: 2004-01-27 06:38 am (UTC)I forgot to add that in the end I realized that my former lover probably will come out much worse out of of this than myself. I have learned a lot by confronting myself with things deep inside of me, were as she has suppressed it all, by not thinking about what has happened.
I'm sure you will also learn a lot from this experience. At least a consolation!
Luc
(no subject)
Date: 2004-01-27 03:40 pm (UTC)And indeed just not changing too much seems to work "better". When I think about it I notice getting insensitive about T. And then when I think further, this feels rather hypocritical to me. First I loved her, now I don't care (so much) anymore. Does that mean I didn't feel the love "for real" in the first place?
The anger you speak of is starting to set in, anyway. I notice that T., despite saying that she wanted to remain good friends, is not really doing that. She is definitely "pushing me away", the way I see it. At first, I just thought it was her way of protecting her decision, that she was not so sure about it really, and was afraid to change her mind. Now I have more negative thoughts about it. I even interpret her continued "wishing me all the best" as a veiled definitive goodbye. I have written some nice friendly letters to her, as a good friend would do (the one I posted on LJ was an example of that), but I never got a reply that would fit with the "being good friends". T. is definitely sticking with her idea to not communicate for a while, "to cool down". In my view, that makes it only more difficult to re-start a friendship after that. I think this will never really happen...
T.'s son, F., was apparently quite distraught by our breakup. He likes me a lot (and I like him too), but T. told me that he was comforted a bit by her telling that we would stay good friends. I'm afraid though that he was "made happy with a dead sparrow" (fobbed off, according to my dictionary). For how often does one visit a "good friend", who is probably not even going to be a good friend anyway, who lives all the way in Lisbon? I think the answer is "never". Too bad for him, too.