Losing Friends and Acquaintances.

FIRST. This is not a "woe is me, feel bad for me, I have no friends" post.
SECOND. You can look back to this post to see my explanation of how friendship kind of works in my head.

Moving on.

I went on kind of an unfriending spree this week on Facebook. I won't go over who I deleted, but I will say that I'm wrestling with it.

Myself, I get too emotional about this shit. Just last night, I saw that someone I knew (in person and on the internet; they live in a different state and we met on a website; we've met in person twice) had unfriended me. I no idea how long ago it was, what I did wrong, or if they even had a reason. Maybe they were just culling the herd.

But the thing is, is on a different website, this person is super-friendly to me. I sent a message and asked if they knew who I was, since my real name is not shown there. I guess they know who I am, but I haven't gotten an explanation as to why they have "unfriended" me on other websites. Not that they owe me an explanation. It's my insecurity, not theirs.

I will/would gladly tell those whom I have unfriended what their sin against me was. If they're interested.

But this is starting to make me re-think the whole "internet friends are real friends" idea. I have people out there that I think I will be in touch with for a long time. But then, the person above was one of those people. And something unknown happened.

I'm not beating myself up over this, but I have a problem. I really do invest myself in too many people. I know that's like someone whining that they are too beautiful or they have too much time on their hands. But I do say too much to too many and expect too much in return.

It's hard to convey exact meaning on the internet. We try to explain ourselves as best as we can, when we care, but it seems that the shit always ends up hitting the fan at some point. Some grievance will be committed, someone will completely (and vociferously) disagree with you, and things will fall apart.

Is it even worth having friendships?

I'm a delicate flower

Once, someone I considered a friend told me I was too sensitive. While I didn't have a witty retort at the time, I later thought that I would much rather be over-sensitive than a raging bitch that seems to take pleasure in putting others down.

Now I'm not so sure.

It takes the tiniest thing to set me off, and it keeps getting worse as I get older. I am sensitive. Most people don't expect it because of my public persona. I'm too complex-- and not in the deep old-soul way. This isn't a "No one understands me!" post. I promise.

What set me off this evening was a seemingly tiny thing, but I considered it to be a severe blow. A former student of mine posted their political views, which do not match mine, on their instagram. It killed me. This student... While I can't fault them for having different views from me, I just felt so sorry for them. And now I can't get it out of my mind. Then I got to thinking that maybe it wasn't okay that they had different views than me. Do they not value their freedoms?! Do they not value choice or rights?! Surely, I thought, they must have been raised in a certain type of household and they never made the decision to look at other political options. I began to pity this student.

In my previous post, I stated that politics have put me in a foul mood. Now, for this tiny reason, one in the hundreds of students I have taught, I am incredibly disappointed. I would give anything--anything-- to be in better control of my emotions. I take my medicine like a good girl. The only thing it really does is make me sleepy, but at least it tends to keep the racing thoughts at bay to a certain extent. A normal person would be able to brush this off. I do feel passionately about my political views, so maybe it's not such an over-reaction. But on the other hand, I taught this student. And hundreds of others. I am just so disappointed. I can't really phrase it any other way.

I'm trying to assuage my panic over this seemingly insignificant thing with music. "Carry On" is a song I just want to curl up next to and let it serenade me to sleep.

Pushing the upsetting thoughts out of my head is so difficult. Too difficult, I sometimes think. Sometimes, it's impossible.