Back in the summer of 1998, in a leaving card from my then job as Programme Administrator for one of Oxford University’s summer course’s, fellow temp, Emma Golley wrote: Keep smiling and making jam! Since then I have always vowed that amongst a plethora of other dedicatees my first novel will be inscribed thus, ‘and Emma, I kept smiling and making jam. It’s a motto that I think nicely sums up me, and my personality. Nothing can really get me down. No matter how much rejection I face, I keep going. It makes me happy.
It’s kind of ironic then, that, tonight, with the preserving pan is boiling away, and the sweet smell of strawberries envelope the air, someone whom I once considered a friend – a good friend – in these pages; someone who I have met in person on more than one occasion and who has been part of some of the most tightly locked filters here, has *defriended* me; has called me an *idiot* and a *twat* and that she *doesn’t want to be my friend anymore*. And all this (unless over a difference of oppinion (not even headedly-so) concerning the merits or not of the Live 8 and MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY campaigns.
This saddens me, as I thought we were good friends. It seems not. That said, if that’s the way that she feels; and that it has suddenly and without warning turned to petty name calling without so much as an explanation, then so be it. I’m not going to argue. If things work themselves again in the future, then yes, I am open to it, but until then… au revoir.
I shall continue to be the friend that I can to those that care and who understand me. I shall keep positive; keep writing; keep smiling and making jam.
Weird weird weird. Who is this strange person?
Quite deliberately, this is a public post; I am smiling; I am making jam; and I am happy. These were the point of the post.
The weirdness of which you speak (for weirdness is what it is) is inconsequential. It doesn’t matter. But it is a public post, and thus is open to all and to google, and for this reason I would prefer not say.
^__^
Who is this strange person?
It’s actually quite easy to work out, with a bit of not-so-lateral thinking 🙂
Eh, I probably could if I kept track of people’s flists…
Ah, I see now. Don’t remember reading that post. Seems rather a storm-in-a-teacup reason to defriend someone!
Well, I’ve strongly disagreed with lots of things people have said on my f’list, but I wouldn’t defriend anyone unless they attacked me personally, or said something that offended me personally. But over a *political* issue, er, no :-/
I wouldn’t like to have friends on my list who agreed with me over everything, would you? Would be so boring. So if someone defriended me because they didn’t like my opinion on something that really didn’t affect them, I say they’re weird and I’m better off 🙂
In theory it sounds quite nice to have everyone agree with you all the time, but in practice, yeah, it’s dulling. I would rather be sparked into thinking about something, even defending my position.
I rarely change my fundamental opinion on the ‘big’ issues (do many of us??), but it only bothers me when someone takes the opposite view if they’re very full-on aggressive about it. Even then I’d be very unlikely to defriend unless personally attacked for holding my particular opinion 🙂
Of course! I think that I would agree with everything that you and Rachel have been saying today. It’s good to have differences. There’s also nothing wrong (sad as it might be) in falling out over something if the ways have parted, so to speak. What does seem pathetically childish is name-calling and a *I’m not playing anymore* mentality without any kind of real explanation.
Thank you for being a friend. And for tolerating me, where we have had differences of opinion. It’s the mark of a true friend. ^__^
Yes, it’s definitely the name-calling, childish stuff that’s wrong in all of this…
I don’t think you and I have had many differences of opinion 🙂
I’d forgotten that there was that post still out there with all the evidence laid bare… 😉
I thought for a minute that you were just very *up* on my friends list! *grins*
Thanks for your support!
Wow. That is just so…weird. It’s very upsetting when someone you consider a friend turns out not to be. But you’re a good person, and your *REAL* friends value you greatly 🙂
No matter how much rejection I face, I keep going.
…and this is one of the many reasons why your true friends like you so much 🙂
That’s so disappointing 🙁 Sorry to hear it.
But yeah, keep smiling. And who knows, maybe she’ll rethink once she calms down.
Maybe she will, maybe she won’t. It’s fine. *shrugs*
I’m a little disappointed because they were one of my first lj friends and, like I said, I thought that we were friends. Maybe we were? It seems now we’re not. It’s her loss not mine – I’ve still got a great bunch of friends (and I’m not just talking about the lj meaning of the word) around me, and I think that they know who they are. *grins*