My favorite breakup—and by "favorite," I mean the only one I look back on with any fondness whatsoever—was downright fun. I was in Month Six of a one-month fling. Steph was making me insane. She was an astonishing, lethal combination of inept and confident. Inept, I can tolerate. Confidence can actually be very attractive...when warranted. But combine the two traits and you have a person who should come with warning buoys. Bungling at a level I previously hadn't known existed, she worried me nonstop. I couldn't trust Steph to do anything adequately, or at all. The sex was fantastic crazy-chick sex, but even that lost its considerable appeal. Knowing I'd put it off for too long already, I determined to break up with her over the weekend. Mid-day Saturday, though, she decided it was time for her own power-play. She presented me with a list of my faults, the non-negotiable list of things about me that would just have to change. And thus did her ineptitude continue to the very end.
In the middle of her speech, I chuckled and raised my hand. "Wait. Stop."
"No. This is important to me."
"I'm sure, but it's about to be overtaken by events."
And then, much more ruthlessly than I'd planned, I dumped her. I told her why. She cried. She tried to retract her list. But of course the list was a coincidence, not the cause, so I was unswayed. But every time I've since been clubbed with a list of my inadequacies, I've thought back with nostalgia to the time when I just didn't give a crap. There's no other word for it: it was sweet.
I find myself revisiting this territory from time to time, usually with acquaintances. Someone who contributes little to my life or the world, who's been nothing but a time- and energy-sink for me, will see fit to level criticism. Never once do they consider what I ask myself about them all of the time: what's in this for me, again? The homage of their company, I guess.
Guess again.
I think we'd all do well to critically examine our role in our friends' lives, to ask of ourselves "what's in it for them?" I ask this about myself all of the time, and I'm not always pleased with the results. Take Katrina. (Please.) I have no idea what's in our friendship for her. I try hard to be a worthy friend, but I still don't give as good as I get. At some point, some folks are just better people, I suppose. But I credit myself with trying, which is more than I can say for a great mass of parasites who view friendship as a cynical economic exercise—as harvesting the most attention and affection they can for the least investment possible. And invariably, these same people are the ones who, like Steph, overplay their hands. They issue demands from/take shots at/lay guilt trips on the very people to whom they have made themselves disposable. If not actual liabilities. And I guess we should thank them for, like Steph before them, making our doing the right thing easy.
Moral: Before you fling attitude about, ask yourself if you're worth it.
Offers Katrina on why, despite the inequities, she continues to be my friend: "Habit."