Don’t Get Attached
Don’t get attached.
I tell myself that every time,
But my negligence of that rule always comes back to bite me
No matter how hard I try.
So far in life,
I have noticed that I am:
Too quiet
Too weird
Too (not) caught up with social trends
Too unfashionable
Etc.
It never used to be a problem
But seventh grade hit me like a ton of bricks
And suddenly I’m realizing
That problems I used to be able to ignore
Are now mountains I have to climb
To keep friends that I used to trust.
In the beginning,
I am always able to relax
Think about how nice it is to have new friends
To enjoy what is never meant to last.
But things always catch up with me
“Escaping” from who I used to be
Trying to reinvent a new, “popular” somewhat-likeable me
Doesn’t work as well as I always hope.
I cling to what I think I have
Yet when it comes down to it
The people I rely on
will slip through my fingers like grains of sand.
Ultimatums are my enemy
Because when you tell my “friends” to choose
I know they would never choose me.
I go to such lengths
To keep friends
Lengths I shouldn’t be going to
But I can’t help myself.
I get attached
I realize that losing the fragile friendship I can barely maintain
Isn’t something I can bear to do
So I clutch at strings,
Desperately trying to pull them back to me
When everything just starts to slip further away.
I don’t know what I did
Or didn’t do
But nothing is enough.
In the end,
They see me as a fallback option
Their “plan b” when things go awry.
When their top choices are gone,
I am acceptable, in their eyes
Worth the extra effort.
Otherwise,
I am the one putting in 110% to get noticed
While they toss in a measly 20%.
I have learned that I need to get better at following my golden rule
To get better at accepting that people will move on from me
As fast as they appeared
And that in the end,
They consider me a “friend”
When it’s convenient
I am just the background scenery
Tacked on to the edge of their life
Almost like an afterthought.
Squeezing into the sides of photos
Getting cropped out
because I’m not one of the people in it that matters
Constantly craning my neck to see what’s on their phone
Because I’m not the person they want to show anything to.
Eventually,
I will just disappear altogether
They will completely stop noticing
That I’m hovering behind them
Looking for a way in
When it sometimes feels like I need a way out.
When it comes down to it
I am not important to them
I do not matter to them
I am a simple object of convenience
And much as I want to run away
They seem like the only option I have
So the sooner I accept it and move on
The sooner I can enjoy the fleeting moments of friendship
They deign to give me
When it seems like a good idea.