I missed two of my good friends’ weddings recently. There’s really no excuse, so I’ll give reasons instead. Poor reasons.
We had invitations. We knew they were coming up. We wanted to go. But I travel often (currently still in D.C.) and never took the next step (the important step) of solidifying the plans and making it happen. I made the mistake of assuming that I’d be reminded at the perfect time and we’d just stroll up there for it. So I call Richard today and ask if it happened yet, and he says yes. It’s a done deal and I wasn’t there. Same for Dennis. Bad form.
I have this problem where I disconnect from people who are not close. If I were to be in the same vicinity as them there would be no doubt in my mind that I’d go to their weddings and such, but once they are gone, it’s like they could get a Nobel peace prize and I’d be uninvolved.
My friends back home are the same way, as is my sister that I’ve only spoken to a handful of times. Every time we talk it’s totally awesome, and we say, “We should talk more.” Then we don’t. It’s not that we don’t want to talk — we really do plan to — it just never happens. I don’t know how many kids she has. I don’t know their names. I don’t know how old she is. And she’s the same with me. No hard feelings, that’s just how it is.
I have to stop being this way, though. For my close friends, anyway. I missed a very close friend’s wedding a while back too, and I never heard anything about it. But it came up recently, and it was in fact hurtful that I wasn’t there. I seem to be quite non-empathic when it comes to guaging peoples’ values of things sometimes. I’ve always evisioned my wedding being me, Susan, and whoever decided to show up at the time. Not lots of people. Nothing special. And I seem to imagine others feeling the same, which is lame.
So to Ken, Dennis, and Richard — I’m sorry for not being there.
