Day 3: Passing Each Other
It's a dream come true for an extroverted introvert like me. I can see what you're doing and laugh with you without the commitment of getting dressed, showering, leaving my house, being somewhere on time...it's absolutely beautiful. There is one thing I do realize is awkward for me, though.
I've been absent for some years, but I see friends from my past...school years, and I think...
Well, isn't THIS is awkward.
I know you because we were so close years ago, but I look at what you share with the world, and I don't know you at all. I feel bad that I don't know if you're being honest on this thing, and I feel worse that I can't catch up. Too many players and moving pieces and Draw 4s in the deck...Truly a game I don't recognize or care to learn. I care like in a passive way. I can't afford to actively care. That would involve effort that I don't even give myself most days. Not to mention, it would complicate the game of life I'm playing on my end of the screen. My life has its share of wild cards now, too. I'm not willing to show my hand nor am I curious enough to lean over and peek at yours.
It's awkward to see people grow and blossom. Morphing slowly as the years pass, who once were my favorite most reliable friends to adults with babies and husbands and wives and homes and careers, addictions and fading hairlines...that's not who I pictured you to become or sometimes I think "Wow! I thought you were gay?!"
I don't know you well enough anymore to say that. Would my opinion be received as hilarious? Probably most definitely not...and that makes me sad because I realize, you don't know me anymore either, but I really wish you did because I'm a better version of who you met. I could be a better friend to you than I was the first time around.
I stalk people on Instagram but in a healthy way. I don't screen shot and zoom into things, but I do read comments to find other people I used to know. I look at things and try to figure out if I recognize that bar you're in. Was I there that night too? Do we have mutual friends that we didn't know in school together but coincidentally met them along our separated life paths? Do our kids know each other? Are you into the same stupid shit that I'm into?
ANXIETY TO THE MAX. It's building up as I think these thoughts. All the people I wish I still held dearly in my heart are flashing through my "feed".
ChompChompChomp
NomNomNom
Eating up all they lil business, keeping it in a mental freezer bag just in case we do ever reconnect, I'm semi-caught up because I've been low-key inadvertently studying you...
lol weird, right?
My social anxiety is triggered by social media, not actual in-person socializing. It's like I see you as a stranger in the busy streets of the world. We catch each other's eyes on occasion but nothing intriguing enough for us to actually stop, pause, connect, catch up. But we do this awkward "I see you" thing every day. You don't see me seeing you and I don't see you seeing me...but I hope you know I'm watching you and cheering you on and that shit is weird to think of in the reverse perspective because I want you to just talk to me in real life...but I understand why you wouldn't. I guess I understand. I'm trying to be understanding. I really don't want to talk to you in real life either. No time for that, way too much commitment
There's no effort or intentions of becoming best friends again, even if we wanted to, we couldn't. That sucks because I think of you sometimes and laugh or cry or insta-stalk until I find the answer to a random curious question related to how you or your family might be doing. I feel weird being "that person" but you, and the times, have left me no choice. I have no way of keeping in touch without fucking your shit up or interrupting mine...and you don't either. I guess...
I'll have to find satisfaction in liking the things you like as we're passing each other in the cyber universe.
-Deena
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