The One with
Ross’ Tan
The first
time I saw this episode, I laughed hard – it was classic Ross. This was also the one where Stifler’s mom,
Jennifer Coolidge, guest-starred as Amanda Buffamonteezi.
In this episode, Monica and Phoebe decide to cut her off. I
remember how I laughed at the hilarity and absurdity of the lengths they went
through to completely ignore Amanda’s attempts to get in touch and get together
with them. I saw this again the other
day, but I didn’t laugh anymore. The
notion of cutting someone off went back and forth in my head, and like a wave
of nausea sweeping over me, I realize that I am Amanda Buffamonteezi.
I’ve never been cut off
before so the feeling is very foreign to me.
It has messed up my headspace and I feel really crappy. There wasn’t a massive fight or a huge
disagreement that signaled the conclusion of the friendship. I feel like it just fell apart.
I think it was almost a year
ago that I read a Facebook note that wasn’t very nice, and I had reasons to
think it might be about me. Now, I’m the
kind of person who likes life uncomplicated.
I’m the type who calls when I want to talk, invites myself or asks to
meet when I want to see someone, and the type who explains or tries to explain
when I feel like I’ve been misunderstood. Even though most of the things written didn’t
apply to me, I still couldn’t shake off the suspicion. In the end, the paranoid in me won. I asked if the note was about me and was told
that it wasn’t.
I’m not a human
polygraph. I have no idea if a person is
lying to me unless he or she is sweating bullets and is looking everywhere
except at me. I was inclined to believe
this person because we’ve been friends for a long time, but the funny feeling
in the pit of my stomach wouldn’t go away.
I didn’t want to be called a drama queen so I didn’t press on the issue,
but I did distance myself away from that friend. I wanted to ask why she felt that way, but I
couldn’t because she’d already told me it wasn’t about me. I wanted to tell her that if the note WAS
about me, she was wrong. I wanted to
take her by the shoulders, give her a gentle shake, and tell her that she has
no reason to feel that way about me because I’ve done nothing wrong to her, or
any of her loved one for that matter. I
wanted to demand what made her think that way, but I gave her the benefit of
the doubt. I believed her because that’s
what friends do. Friends don’t just wake
up one day and decide to pull something out of a magic hat and use it as a
reason to hate on someone and write a passive-aggressive note about it on a
social networking site.
Yes, there was a lot left
unsaid, and I guess we resorted to just sweeping everything under the rug. For a while, things were almost back to
normal, until that one event they forgot to tell me about. I understand that it was an honest
mistake. As someone who would
undoubtedly forget to put on my limbs had they been detachable, I understand
how inviting a friend who’s been coming in and out of your house for numerous
years whether they’re invited or not would escape you. It was not a big deal. The thing that got and hurt me the most was
that when I brought it to her attention, she kind of dismissed it. Yea, I’m all for not blowing things out of
proportion, but if someone is trying to let you know that she felt kind of left
out, the least you could do is listen and not talk to her condescendingly. I know all about how life can get hectic so she
didn’t need to go off reciting a plethora of reasons why I became the last
person on Earth she wanted to talk to. I
was deeply hurt by that. She made me
feel like a petulant child throwing a tantrum because I wanted to sit at the
grownup table during a fancy dinner but was told to stay with the other
kids.
Try as I may
to ignore the feeling of being left out, I felt the friendship change. I’ve never broken up with a boyfriend before,
but I’ve come extremely close to, and this feeling of losing a friend is, in some
ways, harder. Everybody understands that
relationships tend to be fleeting, but friendships are supposed to withstand
the test of time, and friends don’t just up and go. Physically or emotionally. I cannot even begin to explain the degree of
how this sucks.
On one hand,
I wanted to take her word for it. This
is, after all, the person who’s given me relationship advices without
sugarcoating anything. On the other
hand, though, all the signs point to being cut off. I feel like the person who cried on my couch
before because the family and the boyfriend are like oil and water is someone I
wouldn’t be able to talk to about the weather anymore. Was it my lack of effort? I honestly have no idea. I was happy to be a source of comfort, albeit
only a little, during those times when she was having relationship
problems. It felt good that she trusted
me enough to confide in me what she was going through at that time, but I know
it would feel better if she cared about me enough to share with me how good she
has it right now. I want to tell her I
can see she’s happy, but I feel like I can’t.
And it’s not like I can’t reach her…I feel like she doesn’t want to be
reached.
I know that
change is the only thing that’s constant in this life. It is that dynamic force of nature that we
will never be able to run away from. I’ve
tried to console myself with valid reasons why I’m being treated differently
than before – new relationships, hectic work or school schedule, just busy with
life – but it leaves me feeling casted off and, quite honestly, confused and a
bit angry.
I feel kind
of abandoned, and I ask myself if I was ever truly considered a friend in the
first place, or I got to be a part of her life because I just wouldn’t go away,
or just because it was convenient. I’ve
gone as far as to get a card so I could
write how I feel and how I miss the friendship, but my pride made me put it
away – I didn’t want to be the needy girl who begged for friendship. The witch in me who has her middle finger all
geared up stopped me from using the card.
The next time I felt the sadness take over me, I wrote on the card with
every intention of giving it, but the angry one of my multiple personalities
smacked me on the head and asked why I should shoulder all the responsibility
of bridging the gap when I did nothing to put it there in the first place. It seems as if baring the way I feel would
just be like creating my own torture device because I might just be given a
blank stare that screams, “What the frog is wrong with you?”
I still have
the card. I think I’ll give it the next
time I feel like the friendship that I valued so much because it’s brought me a
lot of joy and comfort is going down the toilet and into the sewer. I guess I’m not giving it because I’m not
brave enough to face the realities of a strained friendship.
I am very
well aware that you can’t keep each and every single person that enters your
life, but to feel like you’ve lost someone so important to you is something
that you can never be prepared for, especially if you have no idea why that
person is pulling away from you in the first place. Maybe I want to get to the bottom of things
because there’s so much surrounding the situation that I know nothing
about. I can’t express how grateful I am
that she was there during the dark times of my life, but I would also like for
her to be here so I can share how bright my life is at the moment. But no matter how good I have it right now,
there would always be this weird feeling that there’s something missing. Someone missing.
Maybe we’ll
reestablish the friendship, or maybe we’ll just be two people who used to know
each other. I don’t know. I just don’t
know. Maybe I should stop chasing
someone who is clearly running away from me, but I just couldn’t let it go
because that someone is a friend who became family, although she’s kind of
turning into a stranger now. Maybe I
should just let go of this person who obviously doesn’t care enough about me to
think that I deserve to know the reason why all of a sudden, I’m not welcomed
in her life anymore. Maybe I should just
not care because she evidently doesn’t. I’ve
always been loyal to my friends to a fault, but maybe this time, I should just
stick my middle finger up and say, “Up yours.”
Problem is I am not that kind of friend. Maybe I’m a glutton for
punishment, just waiting for that person to say, “Get the eff out of my life,”
as if the signs weren’t already saying that.
But until
those maybes become certainties, I want to fix it. I just don’t know if you do. I want to say, “You know where to find me,”
but I’m afraid you won’t come. So for
now, just know that despite my confusion, hurt, and anger, I’m here.
You know
where to find me.
