It's been difficult finding an adequate way to wrap up my much ignored "Relationship Injustice" series. By writing all the past articles on this topic, my thoughts revolved around one basic premise: People, by virtue of their own free will, are inherently out of our domain and beyond our control. It's frustrating, but simultaneously selfish and self-ingratiating to think that the people closest to us could be "steered" in various directions. As such, it's an ignorant mistruth to assume that people that were once closest to us would likely be of such a comparable mindset if we were to change or endure less than wonderful times. I found that friends, be they on a somewhat valued level (close or intimate) are a precarious lot. The injustice, in the end, is that those close friends will walk away and cut ties for, as expected, their own reasons and justifications. Those perceived justifications might be irrational, rational, perceived or factual, but everyone is entitled to their own decisions and actions. The rich irony is that the people that were once closest to me, who were supposed to be there through thick and thin, are now the ones who've since decided that I am a complete stranger to them, and have cut me off from all acknowledgement.
I'll explain this entry's title with a somewhat allegorical tale from the Monterey Pop Festival, way back in 1967. One of my personal heroes, Pete Townshend, after having been challenged to follow Jimi Hendrix's guitar inferno of an act, needed to state things in his own way. Before the destructive and chaotic finale that was to be their rendition of "My Generation", Townshend merely stated "This is where it all...ENDS." There was not to be any feigned encore, or tapering off into the Californian night - this was it. The band was going to play the song, destroy the equipment, and the end was definitive. The interaction with the audience was to end, for the night, and such have been many relationships, well beyond a given night. Endings...
A basic premise to be learned from such separation is that time does not heal all wounds. After having been close to various people for significant lengths of time (ranging from 3 to 20 years), it seemed all too easy for people to forget those with which a close bond had been forged. What's frustrating on a personal level, is that despite the irony of the closest of friends having become the most distant, the time of separation has not imparted any effect upon any type of resolution to that initial estrangement. In a personal sphere, I found that I misjudged the loyalty that close friends once proclaimed to me in moments of earnest friendship, regardless of where my personal situations might have stood at any given time. People with whom I spoke on the most intimate levels, on a daily basis, are the ones that regard me as a stranger, and despite years of estrangement and attempts to patch past gaps, nothing will change. Not to pound the idea into the ground, but these were people that I loved, claimed to have loved me, knew of my pitfalls, and were close to me for all times good and bad - be they bad times in their lives or my own. While never having been divorced, I can externally empathize with that level of separation from those with whom so much closeness was once treasured and valued. Male or female, when you know a person's middle name, date of birth, deepest thoughts and hopes, it's a harsh and unfair reality to be categorically ignored and treated as one that never existed or cared in times past.
I should apologize if this entry resembles a personal rant, but perhaps I needed to unload a bit during one of these articles, and it may as well be this one, especially if this is to be the final entry in the series. Call me stupid, (just don't call me collect), but I never would cut ties with someone (nor have I purposely decided to cut ties) for reasons of a friend's status, peaks and valleys, etc. During my darker times in the past, a select few stuck by my side, and the rest decided that, for whatever reasons, it would be too encumbering or inconvenient to stay in touch even in a casual or slightly caring context. Those that decided that I was no longer "fun" had summarily pronounced their philosophy regarding the value of close relationships and cast the die. Let me say that I know for a fact that despite rough patches in years past (as in like 2 or 3 years past), I personally never chose to wrong someone close to me or act so inappropriately as to deserve the subsequent relationship "death sentence" from close friends of the time. With the finality of "endings", as it were, I had been forced to forever drop all respect for those that were my dearest friends and had since cut ties, and warmly shine the highest regard for those that are still there for me, and vice versa, after years of close interaction and care. In all fairness, there have been some people that I had since reconnected with, and they understood that people change, endure various rough moments, and still care after all is said and done.
It's easy to conclude that this entry is some type of salvo against those with whom I no longer associate. A confederate might say to me "to hell with them, who needs them." Unfortunately those estranged past friends will always be people that are of concern to me, and that history can never, in my mind, be undone. Apparently with others, that is not the case. It's hard to end anything, such as this series, and I will be constantly perplexed as to how a person can impart an ending to a close friendship for reasons beyond one's control. To further the irony, the people (be they a chosen few) to which this final article was directed, will never see this piece, or even think of making the effort to test the proverbial waters and attempt a reconnection. In kind, I'd chosen a final entry to this series as a viable venue for acknowledging that I've given up on such aforementioned hopes. While this entry is likely to seem pathetically personal, I realized that most of these "Relationship Injustice" articles were personal in their own ways anyway. Yes, this is where it all ends - at least for this series. For those that opt toward friendship finality as well, good luck. Let the eulogy of such similar relationship injustice be not spoken on your behalf. Out!
Death Letter
15 years ago
