Living Deaths

The problem with being single and living a fairly transient lifestyle (like, say, freelance performing) is that people don't stay your friends after you've left their city. There's no loyalty anymore. I have lost DOZENS of very close friends because they couldn't even be bothered to try the long-distance friendship thing. It's not that it's 'too difficult' -- some of them literally do not even try. I'm constantly texting and emailing and writing to them (with some I even consider calling), trying to keep the lines of communication open, trying to keep updated with their lives, but no replies... no acknowledgement of receipt... nothing.

Eventually I just stop trying. You can only scream into the silence for so long before you finally get it through your thick skull that you're invisible and nobody will ever answer and so you stop trying because there's no point anyway. After all, you don't want to annoy them either -- assuming they're even seeing your texts.

It's so ridiculous. In this age of smartphones, texting, Facebook, Messenger, email... nobody can be bothered to stay in touch because (verbatim) 'I just don't talk to even my very close friends if they're far away.'

Yes, it takes a little intentionality. Yes, you have to sit down and type an entire 'hey, miss you, how are you doing?' into your phone (back in the olden days we had to actually HANDWRITE letters on actual paper and put it in an envelope which we then licked closed and put an address and stamp on it AND THEN had to take it all the way out to the mailbox or -- horrors! -- the post office three blocks away... but yeah, tell me again how typing two sentences on your phone is just too much effort for a person you claim to care about).

I know you all have jobs and 'are busy' -- but if you're too busy to at least fire off a ten-second two-sentence text three or four times a month, maybe it's time to re-evaluate your schedule. I have a married friend with a full-time job who volunteers a LOT at her church as well as teaching art and taking dance classes on the side and she still has the time to text me at least once a week asking how I'm doing. If she can do it -- I daresay a lot of you can.

This means that every single time I move to a new city, I have to start from square one. None of my friends from my last place of residence carry across. I have to start completely over. It's sad, it's annoying, it's upsetting. And what's more, when I do go back to visit, the reception from my 'friends' is inevitably cool, because 'life moves on and people grow apart.' I'm sorry? We grew apart because YOU DIDN'T EVEN TRY.

I've already grieved enough deaths in my short life. Please don't make me grieve the relational deaths of my still-living friends too.