dear friend,

sometimes i wonder if you realize the lengths that i go to, to be your friend. sometimes i wonder if you appreciate how much i tolerate and sacrifice so that you will be happy. more recently i wondered whether or not this was really worth it for me. i wondered if i was really a friend of convenience to you and we would only be friends when it was good for you. i wondered if our friendship was predicated on the fact that we’ve been friends for so long that we no longer had to really be friendly anymore. i wondered if i was just being used.

it is true that we have been friends for a long time and it is true that we had been very good friends at one time. but i did begin to wonder if the measure of one’s friendship is based off of how long we had been friends and i started to think that that was not the case.

it was hard for me to understand why it was that we cannot be better friends. at first i was quite upset and angered by the fact that our friendship operated under the condition that we could only be friends when it was good for you. at first i was outraged to hear that our friendship could only be held either in secret or at an arm’s length at times because it made things easier for you. it was hard for me to realize that there was something external to our friendship that was controlling the nature of our friendship and that there was no desire to fight the external forces.

indeed, these were all hard things for me to understand. you see, i thought that friendship was a simple thing. if we both were good friends then we would just act as friends do. we would not worry what other people would think because it is not relevant and that we were just good friends. if i had a friend near and dear to me, i would fight for them. i guess i just realized that i am no such friend to you. i am not angry to realize this, instead i am plainly disappointed.

and it took me a long time to accept that we really ought not to be the best of friends. it is not so much that we cannot be the best of friends, for i’m sure that if we were to try we could be just that. but it is for reasons out of my control and out of your compulsion that we should just remain friends of the passing sort. perhaps this is for the best, it is the easier path.

i do care about you, perhaps more than i should, and i do wish for you the kind of happiness that i believe you deserve. and if that means that i have to forsake the friendship that i thought we had and trade it with that of a friend in passing, it is with a heavy heart that i distance myself from you into the shadows of acquaintences. we both deserve to be happy and i need to stop being disappointed in my expectations for a friendship that cannot be.

this is not a challenge that i issue to you to correct things. this is not a rant directed to you about an injustice that has taken place. i do understand your plight and i understand your decisions. this exercise has given me clarity about the nature of our friendship and i’ve come to realize that it is for the greater good that we remain simply casual friends.

with great thought,
mike.