Why can't we be friends?

Yes, I said it's fine before
I don't think so no more
I said it's fine before
I've changed my mind
I take it back
Erase and rewind
'cause I've been changing my mind

Sometimes, unexpectedly, some really great things happen. It happened to me that a while back, during a time when I was most vulnerable, I met someone who I thought was pretty great. My appreciation for this person was never romantic, or fanciful. I just REALLY enjoyed their company and it seemed like they enjoyed mine as well.

So we hung out and kept in touch quite a bit and I thought I had a new friend.

On a day like any other, we got together for a drink. One drink turned into four, five, or six and next thing I knew we were smooching somewhere. Now, bear in mind that I do not believe in random hook ups anymore. As far as I’m concerned that’s wrong. Five minutes into it, it dawns on me that I’m smooching with someone I shouldn’t be for a variety of reasons and that I don’t want a part of it anymore. Nothing about this was right. So everything stopped and just as it started everything was over.

One of the things I’ve never liked about hook-ups and one night stands is what I call “the morning after effect”. No matter how little or how well you know the person, you can never really predict what will happen the next day. Because of this very reason, I have a VERY strict policy of not dating friends. As far as I’m concerned, it’s easier to turn a former flame into a friend, than try to save a friendship after a relationship has gone sour. I tend to get really attached to people I care about, for me the friendship is paramount.

The next day, it was weird. I didn’t want it to be and wanted to go on as if nothing had ever happened so I acted as if nothing had ever happened; however, somewhere along the line I became some kind of an ideal in this person’s mind and the whole thing freaked me out. Without any warning, someone who hardly even knew me trusted me with their happiness and I didn’t want that kind of responsibility. I said that I wanted to be friends and asked for some space to let things cool off because I didn’t want to cowardly run. I wanted this friendship. At the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. Now I realize that maybe it wasn’t.

To want to be friends with someone who has a different idea or high expectations from you is like trying to lose weight on a milk and cookies diet. My reluctance to make myself emotionally available as a friend the way I normally would, all it did was create a situation where I now find myself with an acquaintance who doesn’t seem to care much about my feelings and who may or may not be bitter about the way things went down (I haven’t been able to figure that out).

I don’t have much patience for bullshit so I am not going to put up with nonsense from anyone. At the same time though, I think about the time when everything was the way it should have been (completely platonic) and miss it. I feel like I allowed for our friendship to get completely screwed up even though I don't think that's really my fault. It really wasn’t supposed to be this way. If only we could start over...