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Day 179

One year ago a friend of mine of almost 20 years stopped talking to me. Older than me with seven grown children and a devout Catholic, I nevertheless found a friend in her and admired her and her husband’s lifestyle. They lived simply, travelled well, exercised well, donated to good causes, and were generous to us over the years with baby gifts, house-warming gifts, and letting us use their home when we were resettling while they were in their other home on a lake in upstate New York.

I never really brought up our differences. They stayed with us while we were living in Ethiopia and while they were on route to a project they had helped fund. That same year I had read the book “The God Delusion,” by Richard Dawkins, and aligned myself to his thinking. I felt comfortable - and still do - with believing in science over religion, and recognizing the hypocrisy that religion encompasses. As Billy puts it, if there was a god, wouldn’t he have created me to believe in him? Oops. He and I kept our thoughts to ourselves when we were with them.

If I had been brave, I may have acted differently. Once, we were sitting on their porch swing at the house by the lake. I was pregnant with my first child. She was talking about the community around the lake and told me they have neighbors who are lesbians and they recently had a baby through a sperm donation. My friend sat next to me and told me that this little girl will be ostracized all throughout her growing up and that it would have been better for her not to have been born than to have to be raised by two women.

Thinking back, what I believe Billy and I should have done is packed our bags and left. But I stayed quiet and absorbed the shock, pushed it aside in my brain and somehow made excuses for her and for why I would continue this friendship. At the time I just didn’t question too deeply the twisted hypocrisy of how she could be a “pro-lifer” and at the same time wish away the life of a little girl.

About a year ago, we had lunch together. I expressed disdain over something that was happening in DC - maybe the Kavanaugh hearings - and her response was to say that there were people on “both sides” who are creating problems, or however she put it. I dropped the issue, knowing that politics was never our game and we moved on. We had a warm time together, talking about my new job, our families, laughing, and hugging goodbye at the end.

I texted her a few months later and didn’t get a reply. When the pandemic arose, I called her to see if she was OK and left a message. When I again did not hear back, I assumed they were in their house in New York and maybe just had a poor signal. I eventually texted her daughter asking if they were OK. She texted back and said her parents were with them right now, and why don’t I reach out to them. I did. More silence. I guess I still didn’t get it.

The other day I was in my kitchen cooking. I started to think about them again and decided to give it another try. I called her and the phone rang three times before I heard her voice. First I heard her husband talking in the background. Then she barked into the phone, “I’ll call you back!” She didn’t say hello. She didn’t say my name. She didn’t say goodbye. She just hung up. I managed to get in a startled “OK” before I heard the silence on the other end.

Then I got it. And even after I got it, I was still hoping for closure. I sent a short email saying that I’d hoped to hear back from her today. And the next day, I sent my final text asking her what had happened.

I can guess what happened. I can guess that the gulf between our political differences is too great for her to want a friendship with someone as liberal as me. But that’s just a guess. I will never learn why she dumped me. My husband said if she turned her back on me because of our political differences, he had no idea that they were that shallow. I would call it cowardice, for not talking with me directly. But I’ve been in those shoes. I’ve been a coward myself.

What’s ironic is that I believe it’s me that should have given her the axe. I should have laid down that hammer long ago, but I guess I believed that the friendship had value, and I wasn’t brave enough to have those conversations with her.

You know how when you were little and someone didn’t like you, it was always their fault? “Friends” in elementary school are horrible people because they take a dislike to you. And then when you get a little bit older, you see that there are all kinds of personalities. Maybe you’re in your late twenties or thirties before you realize that not everyone is going to like you. Some personalities are just oil and water and it makes no sense to try and change the chemistry.

I have a friend who’s a Christian and believes in a god. He and I have shared a friendship for many years, the sustenance of our friendship being humor and lots of laughter. We talk about all the big ideas - his belief in a god, my beliefs, politics, marriage, everything. He is a friend with whom I can talk openly, despite all the differences. And still laugh. The chemistry works.

And I’m finally getting it, even though it's a bit late in the game. It’s not worth trying to hang on to someone with whom you need to avoid all the big issues rather than talking freely about things that really matter to you.

I don’t need a written closure from this friend who will no longer talk to me. The closure already happened, many, many years ago.

And I won’t leave you hanging any longer. Here’s my deliciousness for the day: cold, left-over orange prune-plum crisp.