old friend dropped bombshell - would love your insights

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10/23/2017 17:37

Subject: old friend dropped bombshell - would love your insights

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Anonymous

Old friend, who had not been in touch for years, pinged me and asked if we could get coffee while in DC for a conference. Was thrilled as I had not heard from her for nearly ten years, even after the death of my mom, a sibling, and a few other major crises. Coffee was amiable enough - caught up a bit on life changes, especially a lot of about what had happened to her. We lead very different lives - she had a lot of opinions on my parenting, but I didn't think so much of it as have BTDT with others. Then she drops bombshell that she had been out of touch as she believed DH and I had been rude to her and her boyfriend (now DH) when they had visited for a conference nearly ten years ago. I did not remember the incident and felt terrible about it. She said she thought it was more DH, but that the whole thing had been rude and she saw no reason to contact me. She acknowledged that she had received emails from me over the years when I had sent congratulations on some professional accomplishments, etc but elected not to respond.

I apologized profusely. I told her I didn't remember this visit (have no recollection of her BF ever staying with us), but still felt bad that this happened - that it was entirely plausible. Both kids were under 5 if her chronology is correct, but I didn't say, "I'm sure I messed up a lot of times when I was exhausted when they were young." She told me she expected I would not remember - I chose to not ask her what that meant.

Left the coffee feeling bad about what had happened and apologized again. On the metro home, I turned the years over in my head. I was deeply, deeply hurt that she did not reach out when my mom died, mainly because I did a lot of the organizing for her mom's memorial service, from food to ferrying guests to cleaning her family house. She never thanked me for it, though I didn't think about it that much at the time. She was in pain, her family is not so functional, and that's what friends do. Now I am sort of dumbstruck - would it have been too hard to just email "sorry about your mom"? When we lived in DC in our early and mid 20s, she would have an occasional grievance, yet have little to no insight about her own conduct in other situations and how her actions may also hurt me or others. FWIW, I was a lot more looped into her life than she into mine. My family (parents, etc) had/have their issues and most UMC folks, even middle class, don't understand them. I learned a long time ago to not talk too much about them unless the person grokked it.

I have had a lot of challenges over the last eight years - the 50s are not easy! - it was nice to see her and hear how she is doing. Yet I also feel pretty crappy now. She didn't really ask many questions and when she did, felt like she was kind of judgy in her responses. Am now wondering if she asked to meet just to clear the air, then move on. I guess that's fine. Now realizing if I were to do such a thing, I hope I would bring a little more grace and perspective to the conversation.