Friendships

I lost a dear friend last month. She loved me as I was and never expected me to be anyone other than who I was. I probably disappointed her every once in a while since she treated me like a daughter and wanted me to be happy. We always are disappointed when our children pick paths that will not lead to happiness. She watched me pick many such paths, but she loved me even though I was not blood. She extended that love to many people, including my children.

I have made many friends in this lifetime. Some more close than other. All essential. That is a blessing that God bestowed on me and it has kept me sane and alive in many dark times. But sometimes, those friendships can be painful.

Today, I asked someone to lunch and it turned into a painful experience. Turns out that she was upset with me. I had apparently not paid attention to her during an activity at church and she thought I was "mad at" her. Apparently, I also did not acknowledge two Christmas e cards that she had sent to me.

It is very possible I may have not paid a lot of attention to her that day for many different reasons, I do not remember, but I know for sure it had nothing to do with being mad at her. I was not. I did not acknowledge the e cards because I never received any from her. I probably would not have acknowledged them anyway, I delete anything that has a link to open. I probably get close to a hundred emails daily, including much junk/trash so I do not worry about that anymore. Go in every so often and delete, delete, delete. That's life on the internet these days.

Two things happened, I apologized and explained that it was not intentional. The day she was worried about was not a social occasion it was a working event and she was paired up with someone else in another room. I did want to hurt her any further and just apologized for not paying more attention to her. Next, she kept insisting that because she thought I was mad at her that I was also being cool to her after that. When I tried to explain that there was no basis for that since I was not mad at her, she went ahead and forgave me. Then I was hurt. If I had not been mad at her why did I need to be forgiven. Oh my, this is starting to get out of hand. Now I am mad at her for forgiving me for something, I felt I didn't do.

Of course there is a lot more to all of this. But it would just get boring to go into every little detail and complicate it even more. Long story a bit shorter, we did not set a day to go to lunch. I left with a sad and guilt-ladened heart.

Afterwards, as I reviewed all that was said, I remembered she felt that as Christians we should not bring troubles to church. Never was my intention, I wanted to go to lunch with her. She never used the words "as friends" only "as Christians" and I started to think that maybe we are not friends, just Christians. My friends have access to a place in my heart that is special. Not all Christians are my friends, not all of my friends are Christians. Not everyone gets let in to that special place. If I open that door and am hurt, I automatically pull back to avoid further pain. I am not even sure if she thinks of us as friends, I know I do. I love her as a friend and as a Christian.

Right now, I do not know where this is going. I am going to put it into My Father's hands and try to be less emotional and let it heal. In the end it is all about love.