The Vine: May 14, 2002
Dear Sars,
I have this friend and it seems like she is trying to avoid me. She is hanging out with people I don’t like and tries to make me hang out with them too. I let her know that I don’t like them, but it seems that she doesn’t care. She is leaving me out of everything she does. Before she started hanging out with them, she told me that I was her best friend here, and she was only friends with them, not “best.” I’m trying to be really nice about it, but why would she make me feel like I’m not her friend anymore. How do I handle it?
Like, just yesterday, I was at the pool and she was with the girl I don’t like, and she never said hi to me or waved, just left as soon as I got there. Is she trying to let me know that she doesn’t want to be friends anymore? Please help me with this because I don’t know what to do.
Confused about friends
Dear Confused,
Yes, she’s trying to let you know that she doesn’t want to be friends anymore.The way she’s doing it is bullshit, and it hurts, but there’s nothing you can do, and she’s not a friend you want anyway if that’s how she treats people.Let it go.
But in the future, don’t get so possessive of your friendships.Your friends can have other friends who you don’t like; they don’t have to choose between you.It’s not a reflection on you.Don’t hold on so hard.
Hi Sars,
Your advice is usually spot-on, and I don’t have anyone to talk to about this, so I hope you can help me out.
I’m an almost-nineteen-year-old girl who has never had any experience with the opposite sex. No guy ever looked my way during my four years of high school, which was okay by me because I had grown up with most of them and was pretty much indifferent to the whole bunch. It was an apathy that was formed in the sixth grade when one of those aforementioned boys turned to me, said, “Hey, you wanna go out some time?” and before I could even formulate a response, he immediately whirled around and asked his giggling friends, “Okay, where’s the buck you promised?”
Anyway, the bad experience in middle school aside, I never had a serious crush until now, my second year in college. This guy, whom I’ll refer to as “Guy,” was my calculus tutor, and not only is he cute, he’s really smart, friendly, and seems to have tons of friends. (I, on the other hand, am pretty much socially inept and an extreme introvert, not helped by the fact that I’m a commuter student.) The first time I saw Guy at tutoring, I wasn’t really paying much attention to him; it was late, and I needed to get the assignment done. A few days later, I ran into him on the inter-campus bus, and we chatted until I got off at my stop.That’s when the crush started, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him since.
I don’t even know if Guy knows my name, or if he has a significant other or anything at all — except, through some discreet inqueries to some classmates, that Guy is really a great, well, guy. So where do I go from here?
Any advice will be greatly appreciated, Sars. I really love your writing, and your advice is always great. Thanks.
Sign me,
Life In Mono Is Really Lonely
Dear Mono,
You’ll have to call him.You can ask him out or you can just shoot the breeze with him, but if you wait for the universe to put you in each other’s path, you’ll be waiting forever.Just phone him up and force yourself to chat with him; you can do that, clearly, since you already did it on the bus.
Maybe he has a girlfriend, or maybe he’s not interested except as a friend, but at the very least you’ll have that moment of courage to feel proud of, and you won’t have to wonder what might have happened.I am intimately familiar with the agony of the Like Call, but you’ve got to see one way or the other.There’s no other way.
Grit your teeth, look up his number in the campus directory, and go for it.
Also, let that sixth-grade thing drop.Seriously.You talk about it like it happened last week.Face forward and don’t let the knobby behavior of an eleven-year-old boy bring you down.
Tags: boys (and girls) friendships
