Right after writing my last post, I received a phone call from an old friend. He saw on my instagram that I was home and wanted to stop by since he was in my area.

At first I thought it might be awkward. I had not seen him in at least 6 years. Do we have anything in common? Do we actually care what each other is up to?

We did some small talk in the beginning. The conversation happened naturally because there actually was a lot of catching up to do. I remembered how much of a good person he is and I felt comfortable. There was nothing awkward.

Since it had been a while, I had to explain how I no longer work for the Department of Children and Families. It was fun explaining that I left a perfectly good and stable job to go on a reality show that flopped and then I moved to California to get my life together, which also turned out to be a flop. (I’m being a little hard on myself. I actually have a great life. Just not the one I imagined.)

He talked to me about his son, ex girlfriend, times with friends. He is in the process of becoming a cop in New Haven. The conversation was flowing.

Then we slid into the conversation of our relationship. It’s interested to talk about this many years later. Come to find out, we have much different recollections of how it went down.

I remember him being a great guy. Always polite, very respectful, and understanding. We were very young and for what it was, it was good.

He remembered me as being cold. If I’m being honest, this isn’t the first time someone has told me that I’m cold. It is something that I am aware I can be, but I didn’t remember being cold to him.

I asked him why he thought that. He said he remembered me being into him and then all of a sudden, it stopped. He thought I lost interested, but stayed with him to play with him. He specifically brought up an incident where I “one up’d him” and he sat for a week upset about the way I played him. I convinced him to give me him password to go through his myspace and read all of his messages. I went through his things first and then he asked for mine. He opened up my account and found all my messages gone. The only person in my inbox was him.

It was interesting listening to this story. I don’t remember it, but I didn’t dispute it because it does sound like something I would have done back then. I really don’t remember having many issues in that relationship, but he does. So much so that he ended the story by saying, “It’s okay though. I learned from that relationship. You aren’t necessarily the reason I became an asshole, but I did blossom into a full blown asshole and learned how to not let people take advantage of me again.”

I sat there in aww. I just finished writing a post about the hurt I felt due to someone else misleading me and how difficult it was to forgive. It’s not just that one post that I was thinking of either. I write posts all the time about relationships and they usually focus around difficulties I’m having with someone. I talk to friends about how difficult relationships are and how it’s difficult to find someone good. I actually get discouraged when it comes to dating because I see the slim picking out there and what my friends go through.

Now I sit looking at somebody I hurt and realize I’ve been one of those bad relationship people. How easy it was to forget that I was once that person.

The moral of the story is, we have all hurt and been hurt. It’s part of life. It further affirms my last post regarding forgiveness. You must forgive yourself for the mistakes you made and you must forgive the people that hurt you so that maybe one day you can sit together on a porch and laugh about old times.

You can learn from each other, gain perspective, and live without anger towards the past.