I heard the message that you left on my voice mail this morning. It was normal enough, "Hey, how are you? This is me checking in." sort of thing.  It was the kind of message that friends leave each other every day. What bothered me about it, though, is that you and I are not friends any more and haven’t been for a long time. It irritates me to no end that you don’t seem to understand that, or the reasons why.

I remember the day that we met. You had been my neighbor for two years, but beyond exchanging some pleasantries about our dogs and the local hiking trails, we had never talked much. You appeared on my doorstep one Sunday morning, a few months after a bitter break up with your live-in-boyfriend. You were feeling a little lost, and I invited you in to join Dave and I for some coffee and smokes. I thought then that you seemed like the sort of woman I like to have in my life; sexy and adventurous, vulnerable and funny. We had a lot of laughs that morning, all of us sitting around in our pajamas, ignoring the rain, listening to Sheryl Crowe and telling our favorite revenge stories.

We became friends quickly, and I learned the story of your life. Addicted to pop psychology, you were always looking for reasons why your life was not as happy and carefree as you thought that it should be. Over endless cups of coffee I listened for hours as you cried about how other people hurt you and how you weren’t sure about your new long distance relationship. I listened while you blamed your current mindset (at the age of 34) on people that were cruel to you in high school.  I listened while you betrayed the darkest secrets of people that we knew in common; who had had an abortion, who was sleeping with a married man, who was in therapy, who had belonged to a cult, and who was in therapy. You called me your best friend.

It was after you returned from Utah that I realized how little friendship meant to you.  Penniless and broken, you called me for help. I was the one that paid for the Penicillin to cure that infection you brought home, and I was the one that bought you the home pregnancy test. I was the one that went with you to the doctor to confirm the negative result.  My life had taken several interesting turns at that time, but I put them on hold to be there for you again.

There were times when I could have used a friend. I am a self sufficient woman, fully capable of handling any situation, but it would have been nice, for once, to have you hold my hand and offer to be strong for me. While you were whining about being afraid of being pregnant after deciding to have unprotected sex, I was involved with a trial that set a new legal precedent. While you bemoaned the lack of money you had after racking up your credit card buying shoes and makeup, I was on the verge of re-losing my virginity after six years of celibacy. You don’t know about these things, or anything else about me though, because you were to busy getting stoned and complaining about how your life lacked direction. Two more months went by before I realized what I had bought into by being your friend.

We did not have a give and take relationship. Instead, it was "The Lisa Show" and I was a captive audience, watching you set yourself up to fail over and over again. You cast yourself as the needy diva, forced by some Divine director to speak the lines of a script written by everyone in the world but you.  I was the safety net underneath your high wire act.  I gave you the gift of a year of my life, and you chose to use me as a mirror. I was just another silvered surface you used to admire your own reflection.

Let me tell you about the kind of people that I choose to keep in my life; they are people that don’t waste much time worrying about what others think of them. They recognize that despite their best efforts, sometimes life is just shitty for no reason at all, and they are strong enough to move past this, and seek contentment and joy and happiness. They do not set their lives up for failure, and then point the blame at everyone except themselves. They know that living is about action, not reaction. They understand that it is inexcusable to blame gender for behavior.

You are none of these things. You have chosen a cowardly course in life. Believing that you can walk blameless through the mine fields that you set up for yourself, you cling to others for comfort and strength when those shells explode in your path. I refuse to help someone who will not exert the time or energy to help herself. I choose not to be strong for you.

I have not returned your calls for more than six months and I do not ever intend to. Please respect my decision not to include you in my life.

Sincerely,

Averah