I have a sense of …unsteadiness these days, regarding the world around me in all sorts of ways. Physically, in that I’m getting older and more easily apt to fall or be knocked down by some mishap; politically, for sure, as I live in the Commonwealth of Virginia where I’ve seen a three-ring circus starring our top three elected officials lately (and may I say, Mark Herring in particular broke my heart); but what I especially want to address is INTERPERSONAL transience. I’m not talking about the change that occurs when a loved one moves, falls ill, or even dies; these are life-events that are normal in the course of a friendship and something that I take into account. What I am referring to is relationship instability and unreliability.
Two examples: I had a friend (NOT a millennial) who was supposed to pick me up from the grocery. He had sent me a text offering to do so. I replied saying I would take him up on his offer and told him I was waiting outside the grocery. I waited and waited AND WAITED. He didn’t show. Finally, luckily some other friends came along to offer me a ride, otherwise I would had to wait another hour, b/c I had missed transit. He never replied to a text I sent telling him I was going home. I’m unsure now if he’s getting my texts or what, and calling is no good historically with this particular person. But okay, whatever. Maybe he had an emergency or we had a failure to communicate somehow. But I’m left with having to process this. Ugh. Today I sent him a text asking what he was doing for lunch. No answer again.
I had a friend tell me yesterday that SHE had a good long-term friend IRL just drop her and not tell her why. She said she has no idea WHY the friend did this-they had had no argument, fight, disagreement or anything resembling anything that should cause such a move. I told her that I think it most likely had nothing to do with HER. But something these days is causing people to lose their ability to make friends, keep friends, or just to plain BE friends. The simple things that I was taught: Communicate (listen; talk); show up when you say you will; let someone know if you CAN’T; keep in touch (preferably via some human method) regularly; BE THERE…..I just don’t think people can do these that much anymore. They’re either forgetting how, if they were taught (like people of my gen-and I gotta say, I’m picking up some BAD HABITS from some of my younger friends) or they’ve never learned in the first place. It’s like DEEP READING…it’s something I try to keep doing and sadly fear I fail to do very well any more.
So, for those of you out there reading this. I hope YOU are faring better than I these days! Maybe if you have a family or a partner, you are not experiencing such a sense of precariousness and impermanence. And I’m not saying that most of my friends have exhibited such behavior. But I’m saying that in general people are less reliable than PUBLIC TRANSIT……and that’s a sad commentary on the state of affairs.