What I Wish I Could Say

Because Mara has made it clear that she has no interest in my point of view, I can't talk to her about anything. Why should I waste my time trying to talk to someone who doesn't want to hear what I have to say?

But if I'm going to truly move on, there are some things I need to tell her, which are as follows.

Dear Mara,

Setting aside for the moment your horrific treatment of me, there are some things I need to tell you. First of all, when you refused to talk about my point of view, you made me feel like my opinions and my point of view are invalid. That I'm not allowed to have my own point of view and that I'm just supposed to adopt your point of view. Well, if you think that, you're wrong. Nobody can have exactly the same point of view, because we are all different people. Plus, friends are supposed to try to understand each other's points of view. I don't mean that you have to agree with my point of view, I'm just saying that you need to understand it. You can understand it and then disagree with it if you like, but it is very important to me that you at least try to understand it. The fact that you refused to talk to me about my point of view indicates that you are a bad friend.

Now let me get into that point of view. To be clear, I am not blaming you for my mistake. I take full responsibility for the fact that I fucked your first boyfriend, after you had explicitly told me not to do that. I did it anyway, and I'm sorry. That was my mistake. I am not blaming you for the fact that I did that.

However, you need to realize that you made some mistakes of your own. And just like I'm not blaming you for my mistakes, you shouldn't be blaming me for yours. You need to take responsibility for your mistakes, it's that simple. If we both do that and learn from our mistakes, I can see us being great friends again someday.

You made the following mistakes:

1. Not being honest with me about how you felt about Ray. You said that you were "faking it till you made it" in trying to get over him. But how was I supposed to know you were doing that? You didn't tell me. All I heard from you was that Ray was the "completely wrong guy for you" and that he was a "loser druggie who couldn't graduate." Those aren't the things you say when you still care about someone. I'm sorry, but they're not. If I had known you were faking it till you made it, it would have been different. I would have understood that you were saying those things not because you didn't care about him anymore, but because you wanted to get to the place where you didn't care about him anymore. Your mistake of not being honest with me led me to believe that you didn't care about Ray.
2. Telling me not to date someone that you didn't care about. A direct result of #1, you mislead me into believing that you did not care about Ray anymore. So from my point of view, it was ridiculous that you were telling me not to date someone who you didn't even care about. You aren't allowed to reserve all the guys in the world for yourself. But if I know that you care about someone, I'm not going to step on your toes. I thought I was stupid that from my point of view, you didn't care about him, and still had the nerve to tell me he was off-limits.
3. Telling me not to date your ex when I had given you absolutely no reason to doubt me. First of all, at this time I was not attracted to Ray and he was the last person I thought I would date. I told you this, and meant it at the time, and yet you still thought I would betray you somehow. I had never done anything to betray you before. It was kind of like a slap in the face, that you would assume I would do something like that when I hadn't yet given you any reason to doubt me or not to trust me. In fact, that kind of made me want to do it. If you were already assuming I would fail, when you had no reason to think that I would, and nothing I said would convince you that I wouldn't do it, I kind of just wanted to do it. I wanted to fail because you were convinced I would fail, and nothing I said would assure you that I wouldn't.

Therefore, in the future, you need to be more honest with me. If you're telling me that a guy is off-limits, then you had better be honest with me about how you feel about him. If you're faking it till you make it, let me know that that's what you're doing. It's that simple.

That being said, maybe this isn't something you will understand for awhile. You're only 21. When I was 21, I hadn't yet learned that good is a point of view. Nobody thinks that they are evil when they do evil things. Everybody thinks that their own actions are justified. If they didn't, they wouldn't do them. I didn't learn this until I had just turned 23, so maybe you won't understand for a few years. But I hope that someday, you'll understand this concept. When that time comes, I'll be willing to discuss my point of view with you.

Also, you're going to have to forgive me if we're ever going to be friends. Friends don't think that someone is indebted to them for mistakes that they made. Friends don't hold those mistakes over each other.

So when you're ready to hear what I have to say, and when you're ready to forgive me, give me a call. Until then, I'm done.

Your Veronica