Life works in mysterious ways. I recently wrote a post entitled The High Road, about my outreach to a neighbor and (ex)friend with whom I’ve had a falling out. She never responded, by the way.
A couple of weeks ago, I received an outreach from another friend with whom I’ve not spoken in about a year. I met this woman at work and we hit it off almost immediately. There have been a couple of bumps in the road. At one point, she got angry with me, hung up on me, and we didn’t talk for six months. We saw each other at a coffee shop and any prior resentments seemed to melt away. We more or less picked up where we left off.
For six months or so, I thought things were going pretty well. But then, she was always too busy to get together, wasn’t initiating much contact and not particularly responsive to my efforts to get together. After several weeks (or was it months?) of this–and in the wake of another “too busy” response–I told myself that I wouldn’t reach out again. I would wait to hear from her.
I never did.
Then, about three months ago, I was visiting a client in the same building where she works and I wrote her an email to say I’d been thinking of her and to wish her a Merry Christmas. Crickets.
Then, months later and out of the blue, I got an email from her asking if I’d like to get together for coffee or lunch. I’m struck by the irony that I would find myself on both sides of this equation within a couple of weeks of each other. In The High Road, I wrote about reaching out not because I expected a response or a reconciliation, but because I wanted to behave in a way that’s consistent with my values. I want to be someone who is able to make amends, to move forward, to recognize my own role in whatever may have transpired.
For the first time, it occurred to me that there is more than one narrative to the story with my friend who “faded out”. From my vantage point, I thought I was reaching out to get together and that my efforts were being rebuffed. From her perspective, I might have dropped out of the picture mysteriously and without warning. She might not have been “keeping score” regarding who was reaching out to whom and may not have been aware that she appeared to be distancing herself. She may have been hurt that I suddenly stopped calling, or perhaps she thought I was mad at her. Or perhaps we are just two adults with full lives who got caught up in the busyness of kids, spouses, work, errands and other commitments. Either way, we both own a share of the communication breakdown that led to a year of no contact.
I responded to her outreach and we got together recently–and we were able to pick up right where we left off. We had a nice time catching up and got together a second time soon thereafter. I was not only glad to reconnect with her, I was grateful for the reminder that there is more than one way to interpret a situation.
My commitment to myself going forward is to be more honest and open. Rather than assume that she was pulling away, I could have asked her. Instead of making a unilateral and undisclosed decision that the next outreach would come from her, I could have had a conversation and told her that she seemed busy and to give me a call when things slowed down.
The reality is that friendships ebb and flow. To maintain a long-term friendship, you have to be able to find your way back to each other and, without grudges or resentment, move forward.