Alud Lang Syne: Lure Fishbar (1/26/2007)

Hindsight is 20/20, especially in relationships. After Doug and I ended our brief relationship we made a valiant attempt at a friendship. An attempt that did not end with us becoming friends and in hindsight it all looks much clearer.

Doug and I reconnected months after we ended our relationship. After drinks and a therapeutic discussion that confirmed neither one of us wanted to “get back together”, we quickly fell into a comfortable friendship involving TV viewing on his couch, restaurant week dinners at Lure Fishbar and movies in Bryant Park.

I was proud that we had maintained such an amicable breakup and I was obsessed with the idea that remaining friends with an ex showed some kind of maturity, something that Doug didn’t fully understand. Nonetheless, we stayed good friends for several years, until he started dating someone and suddenly re-interpreted my interest in being friends as something more.

I knew I didn’t want to date Doug. Keeping him in my life as a friend allowed me to see that. He was the same guy I had dated years before and it hadn’t worked then. Still, I was upset by the idea that he felt the need to push me out of his life because of his relationship. It made me feel as if we’d been doing something wrong by being friends. But when I tried to discuss it with Doug, all the words came out in a jumble that only caused him to become more suspicion of my intentions.

My obsession with proving that exes can be friends, turned into Doug recasting me in his head as a femme fatale. Doug’s ego got the better of him and he refused to trust me. Slowly, it occurred to me that since Doug had been the one to end our relationship, he would always believe that I still harbored feelings for him. I was insulted and hurt by his accusations and he doubted my motives, so we walked away from each other with little more that an e-mail.

Nine months after Doug and I stopped talking, I bumped into him at a rooftop 4th of July party. When I turned the corner and spotted him, I bolted, taking the steps two at a time with a very confused Jade chasing after me. Before I could process my reaction, my fight or flight response had already kicked in.

Doug and I had no friends in common, so how we had managed to find ourselves at the same party was beyond me. All I knew was in that moment; I didn’t want to see him. After Jade dragged me back to the party, Doug and I spent the rest of the time ignoring one another, him out of distrust and me out pride. We didn’t speak that day and we haven’t spoken in all the days since.

I still believe that maintaining a friendship with an ex shows a level of maturity, but only if you are both mature enough for it, and in the end neither of us was.

*Recognize this song title? Post in the comments section.

"You realize of course that we could never be friends " - When Harry Met Sally