It never occured to me how much I rely on certain things for comfort. When I feel sad, or lonely, or tired, there are certain things I have become accustomed to doing to cheer myself up. When I am cold, or really lonely, I bundle up in my University of Michigan sweatshirt and pants, and then I feel better. When I miss home, I always can rely on my emails from family I have posted on my walls, and my pictures to make me smile. When I need a good cry, I have my trusty stuffed animals I hug and my perfect crying mix that I put on my ipod (now that it works!).
I didn’t realize, however, that I spend a lot of time thinking about people to call to cheer me up. Most of the time, it works, I have my set people! My mom for support, my aunts to make me smile, make me happy, my cousin to make me laugh, and then my friends. I have those set friends who I can always count on, or I thought I could. Sometimes, I guess I don’t realize how distant I ahve become from people until I finally talk to them, and it’s all different. That happened today. I called one of my trusty friends, one of my best friends, or so I thought. And then, mid conversation, after 2 months of not talking, it hit me. I’m the only one making an effort here, I’m the only one who cares if we talk. As much as this person tried to tell me I was wrong, I knew I was right. And it was all sealed when said person hung up on me because they had another call coming in after only 5 minutes of conversation after a 2 month void. I was the one paying, this person wasn’t doing anything that couldn’t be put off. It was just out of selfishness, that after 6 years of sharing our lives together, this person couldn’t give me the 5 minutes i needed as a friend. Maybe I was expecting too much! But, it hurts! It hurts to know that I have to re-evaluate that friendship that means to much to me. I miss my friends!
I guess my heart is too open, and I depend too much on other people. Most of my friends would be there for me, that I know. But I guess I need to re-evaluate my list of calls. I need to reconfigure who I can count on, because clearly that has changed. My heart is fragile, breakable, open and full of love. I think all of our hearts are like this. Too bad more people don’t recognize this!
Rabbi Eve Posen 