Just before Christmas I was de-friended (by email) by an old friend (from my undergraduate years at uni). It was the first time that's ever - at least openly, explicitly - happened to me. It was ostensibly based largely on a misunderstanding (she was mad that I hadn't replied to an email telling me she was pregnant, but I had never received the email), but I'm guessing it's really more a long term resentment that I don't call/write/whatever enough. And, interestingly to me, that impression of hers seems to be partly due to my presence on Facebook.
From her perspective (I think) I spend enough time on facebook that I should have time to call her more often. Actually, I spend very little time on facebook, but because I often leave it open half the day, and check and comment on people's status updates when I pop into the study for five minutes here and there - not to mention update my own status via twitter (which is sometimes via mobile phone, so I'm not even at my desk), it seems to her like I'm there a lot.*
I replied to her cross email immediately, of course, even though I was in the middle of packing to leave for our holiday (which I always do at the last minute, so we didn't end up leaving until really late and didn't end up getting there until 11:30 at night, at which point the kids were so excited by their bunk beds that they didn't get to sleep until 2am - so you can see that stopping in the middle of my packing really meant something). And then later - while we were away - I decided to add her to a limited friend list in facebook so that she wouldnt see my status updates any more. I was starting to feel paranoid about them. That's when I discovered that she'd also defriended me on Facebook (unless she's quit facebook altogether, which is certainly a possibility I suppose).
When I got back from our holiday (we went to Forster to visit my grandfather for Christmas, did I mention that?) I emailed her again, just a brief email to reiterate the main points of my (rather longwinded) first one - that I was sorry I'd hurt her, that I hadn't known she was pregnant but was thrilled to hear it, that I did value her friendship. She hasn't replied, and for all I know she sent my emails straight to the trash without reading them. Or she read my first one and got more offended, I don't know (her email was *quite* sarcastic, so while I thought I was being all objective and conciliatory in my first email, I think I was actually feeling rather defensive).
I've considered calling her. Maybe it's a no brainer that I should have called her to begin with. Email is probably not the best medium for such conversations. But when I got her original email I was in middle of packing and was really needing to get Kaely down for a nap (yeah, we left *really* late). I could have called when we got back from the holiday (I did tell her we were about to leave town for a week), but... the truth is when I re-read her email I felt pretty cross myself. She was awfully sarcastic and frankly she seems to have cut me off over a misunderstanding without bothering to give me the benefit of the doubt, or even a hearing. And given that we see each other so rarely anyway, I wonder if our friendship can come back from that. She could apologise (though she may not), I could apologise (and I have - for being generally unavailable - it's true that she would call me more often than me her, though I'm talking once or twice a year here), but can that make the bad feelings go away sufficiently, or would it simply mean that we were ostensibly friends again only to lose touch less deliberately?
I did value her friendship, she's a lovely person and a pleasure to spend time with. But I'm worried that if I call her she won't apologise, and we'll both get cross, and instead of patching things up it will leave things as they are but with an even worse taste in both our mouths. Or alternatively we'll patch things up but my every interaction with her will be tinged with guilt that I don't make more effort and therefore resentment that she expects me to, and... well, given that we really don't see much of each other anyway - she lives in country Victoria, and I haven't made it down to see her since her wedding four years ago, and she hasn't been up here for even longer - is it really worth it?
And, I admit that I do feel cross that she seems to have written me off so easily, so there's a part of me that wants to just say to hell with her.
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*This is a whole different post that I am probably never going to get around to writing, but it is an interesting side of social networking sites -that they make your every action so open, people can easily measure - how many times did she write on X's wall, compared to Y's wall or my wall? And, especially when there are people who use social media extensively who are 'friends' with people who use them only hesitatingly, there are bound to be some of these issues pop up.