Sadder but wiser, again

Not surprisingly, I didn't sleep well last night. I'm tired and heartsick and feel like complete crap. But of course life goes on and work continues.

Apparently I am more my father’s son than I want to admit. My affection comes with an unrealistic expectation of fealty. I am guilty of consistently over-estimating my importance in the lives of others, and apparently I have done it again.

I can remember once, when I was new to my position with Gates, giving a seminar about collections and how it works. I asked one of my agency guys to come up from Atlanta to help answer questions. Since I field frequent questions from co-workers about my job, I assumed that the people I work with would be interested and appreciative. I can still remember how I felt when I read the vicious, horrible responses on the confidential comment surveys when they came back. When I mentioned this to a friend, she said "Well of course they hated it, Steve. You dragged the cows from their desks, bombarded them with information, interrupted their breaks, and made them think. Of course they hated your guts." I had thought the whole thing went beautifully. I had thought my peers liked and respected me. I had walked straight over a cliff like Wyle E. Coyote.

That's how I feel today - as if the shadow of the big rock just gets bigger and bigger, and my former safety net is in fact a tiny umbrella. Since Michael left, I have consoled myself with the thought that I am a rich man in the ways that really matter. I never really minded not being that close to most of my family because I had such a large "family of friends". I thought I had a strong network of people who truly cared for me - people I could count on if I needed them. I now realize just how few people like that I know.

I have a wide circle of acquaintance and a number of places where I am welcome. I can certainly hunt up a party or something to do pretty much any time I want. But it is brought home to me now how tenuous my ties are with my friends. So long as I am entertaining and charming and cook well, I can count on that circle of acquaintance. But if I truly need someone, there are very few people I can really count on. I suppose it is better that I know this. But like most home truths, it is knowledge painfully won.

I’m not sure what to do with it. Do I allow this to affect my present friendships? Do I withdraw to spend my time with the few people I know who are what I thought they were? Or do I continue as before, pushing this truth to the back of my mind to once again live in a fool’s paradise? Right now, my old life feels like a waste of time. I don’t know that I can go back to it with this perception so at the forefront of my mind, and I really don’t want to. I want to crawl in a hole and pull it in after me.