Monday, October 24, 2011

When friends "unfriend" you

I’ve been thinking a lot about power trips lately. Living in DC, it’s all about power. Perceived power, imagined power, and sometimes real power. This is the most difficult place I’ve lived. I can’t leave my house without running into someone who wants to “hump my leg” to use a politer euphemism. However, it’s one thing if it’s the obnoxious passengers on the public transit system and in the grocery store but it’s quite another if it’s a friend.

One of my friends misunderstood something I said last week, got herself really upset, and as of last night’s e-mail, I was booted to the curb as a friend.

What bothered me most isn’t that she didn’t give me a fair hearing. Nor was it that she didn’t even let me clear up the misunderstanding. All she wanted to do was to yell at me. Then she forbade me to mention her name in conversation with others.

Well, this is the United States and I was born here so am a citizen. As a woman, as a US citizen, as an American woman, forbidding me to speak her name is what really made me angry. Whether or not she likes it, I have a right to complain to my friends about her. My Italian family tried to shut me up. But I didn’t let them or even my husband succeed. So, my question to the audience, why should I let her?

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