F-list

It's ridiculous how much fear I have of checking my f-list.

Feels like too little, too late, to jump back in now, really. Can't save something that's been destroyed so thoroughly. Doesn't matter that I always cared - you have to show it, too. If you can't, for whatever weird mental reason, then that's too bad, but it's really not the problem of the people you abandoned; it's yours.

In books and movies, people make a clean break, leave their lives behind, make a new life with new friends somewhere else. That's how you do it. You don't get a second (well, okay maybe a second, but not a third - and I'm on my fourth or fifth try here) chance with people you treated like dirt for years. You accept that you can't fix the hurt, and that some relationships are lost. You just have to accept that you screwed up, and do better with the new people who come into your life.

No matter if you still miss the old ones.

The odd thing is,

there were a few times in my life when I seemed to be somewhat okay in the social contact department. Those times never lasted very long, true... but for short periods, I could manage this friendship thing.

Why can't I do it in a sustained way? Why only for a year or two?