Advice Please
Posted: Sat May 26, 2007 8:06 am
This is probably going to be a long one, feel free to skip over it or go get yourself a beverage. Thanks in advance to anyone willing to read through it. And I realize probably nothing's going to come of this situation for a whole variety of reasons, ranging from the moral/ethical to the logistical.
Back in the 80s (cue 80s music & inflate hair to an appropriately large size), I became good friends with a guy (I'm a woman & we're both heterosexual) through a mutual friend. We were all around 20 at the time. He had a big crush on her, so I never really thought of him as someone to date. After about a year or so, she insisted he had a crush on me. I thought she was either trying to make me feel better or make him feel better. I had no self confidence back then & I was never very good at reading those "cues" (I'm still not very good at it). We spent time together, mostly in big groups and tended to hang out because we have a similiar sense of humor, musical & movie interests.
Then most of our friends graduated & I stayed in the same town for a few years after (his hometown). We started spending more one on one time together. He asked me to his work Christmas party and I started thinking of him as perhaps more than a friend. Then he turns around and stands me up on not one occasion, but 2 (a birthday & New Year's Eve). I make the best of the birthday by renting a movie I wanted to see & ordering my favorite dinner for takeout. New Year's I dealt with by putting on my nicest dress and going out alone. I ended up meeting a very nice group of people who were kind enough to include me in their plans. We had a falling out over those 2 events and never dated. When my father passed away, the mutual friend told me he felt very badly & wanted to call me, but wasn't sure how I'd react. So I called him, he apologized and we sort of smoothed things over, but I moved from the town shortly after. We had occasional e-mail/phone contact afterwards.
So, time montage to New Millennium and all. He has since married. We get in touch again at the end of last year & it's right around New Year's and he asks what my plans are, apologizing again for the stand up. I told him it's all water under the bridge & we buried that hatchet ages ago. He replies that he still felt bad about it and that he had a bad tendency to self-sabatoge when he was younger. And he said he had feelings for me and didn't know how to handle them so that's why he did the 2 stand ups. Our mutual friend had said that back when it happened, but due to the not hearing it directly from him and the self-confidence issues when I was younger, I didn't believe her. Since he's since married, I didn't think it was appropriate to say anything other than "glad you've managed to change that & build a happy life with [his wife's name]" in response to his acknowledgement of why it happened.
So we're in fairly regular contact (mostly through e-mail). They've hit a rough patch and may be getting divorced. I honestly do hope they can work it out and I don't want to do anything to interfere with that. I've never been married and I'm not particularly religious, but I do have an enormous amount of respect for that bond and the people who try to honor it. So I've kept my comments more along the line of "I hope you 2 can work it out", etc.
But if they do proceed with a divorce (& only if they do), when would be an appropriate time for me to mention the feelings were reciprocated? I don't want to interefere with any reconciliation between them (there are no kids, but I still respect the bond as mentioned before). And I imagine even if they do get divorced, he may not be ready to hear that right away. But if they do get divorced (& only if they do), I would like to say something about the reciprocated feelings. Complicating things even more (as if they weren't complicated enough :-3 ) we live in different parts of the country. But he's talking about possibly relocating & has roots in this part of the country.
And he hasn't so far, but what if asks me about the whole reciprocation thing point blank? I gave him sort of a politician's answer about it when he finally did bring it up. Obviously, if they do decide to divorce, then it's ok to answer it honestly. But what if he asks me before that point? What do I say to respect their bond, but not deny that the feelings were reciprocated?
Well, thanks so much for reading all of this and if anyone has any advice, I'd greatly appreciate it.
Back in the 80s (cue 80s music & inflate hair to an appropriately large size), I became good friends with a guy (I'm a woman & we're both heterosexual) through a mutual friend. We were all around 20 at the time. He had a big crush on her, so I never really thought of him as someone to date. After about a year or so, she insisted he had a crush on me. I thought she was either trying to make me feel better or make him feel better. I had no self confidence back then & I was never very good at reading those "cues" (I'm still not very good at it). We spent time together, mostly in big groups and tended to hang out because we have a similiar sense of humor, musical & movie interests.
Then most of our friends graduated & I stayed in the same town for a few years after (his hometown). We started spending more one on one time together. He asked me to his work Christmas party and I started thinking of him as perhaps more than a friend. Then he turns around and stands me up on not one occasion, but 2 (a birthday & New Year's Eve). I make the best of the birthday by renting a movie I wanted to see & ordering my favorite dinner for takeout. New Year's I dealt with by putting on my nicest dress and going out alone. I ended up meeting a very nice group of people who were kind enough to include me in their plans. We had a falling out over those 2 events and never dated. When my father passed away, the mutual friend told me he felt very badly & wanted to call me, but wasn't sure how I'd react. So I called him, he apologized and we sort of smoothed things over, but I moved from the town shortly after. We had occasional e-mail/phone contact afterwards.
So, time montage to New Millennium and all. He has since married. We get in touch again at the end of last year & it's right around New Year's and he asks what my plans are, apologizing again for the stand up. I told him it's all water under the bridge & we buried that hatchet ages ago. He replies that he still felt bad about it and that he had a bad tendency to self-sabatoge when he was younger. And he said he had feelings for me and didn't know how to handle them so that's why he did the 2 stand ups. Our mutual friend had said that back when it happened, but due to the not hearing it directly from him and the self-confidence issues when I was younger, I didn't believe her. Since he's since married, I didn't think it was appropriate to say anything other than "glad you've managed to change that & build a happy life with [his wife's name]" in response to his acknowledgement of why it happened.
So we're in fairly regular contact (mostly through e-mail). They've hit a rough patch and may be getting divorced. I honestly do hope they can work it out and I don't want to do anything to interfere with that. I've never been married and I'm not particularly religious, but I do have an enormous amount of respect for that bond and the people who try to honor it. So I've kept my comments more along the line of "I hope you 2 can work it out", etc.
But if they do proceed with a divorce (& only if they do), when would be an appropriate time for me to mention the feelings were reciprocated? I don't want to interefere with any reconciliation between them (there are no kids, but I still respect the bond as mentioned before). And I imagine even if they do get divorced, he may not be ready to hear that right away. But if they do get divorced (& only if they do), I would like to say something about the reciprocated feelings. Complicating things even more (as if they weren't complicated enough :-3 ) we live in different parts of the country. But he's talking about possibly relocating & has roots in this part of the country.
And he hasn't so far, but what if asks me about the whole reciprocation thing point blank? I gave him sort of a politician's answer about it when he finally did bring it up. Obviously, if they do decide to divorce, then it's ok to answer it honestly. But what if he asks me before that point? What do I say to respect their bond, but not deny that the feelings were reciprocated?
Well, thanks so much for reading all of this and if anyone has any advice, I'd greatly appreciate it.
I remember skinny leggings when they first came out & I could still wear them!