By Antonio Castellano

Old Far Friend

As Christmas homework, we have to choose among different experiences to do and then, once lived, we have to write a SCAB about it. One of those options was “contact a friend that you haven’t spoken to in years”. When I read that I immediately thought of a friend I used to be very close years ago. Actually, he was my best friend, the most important one I’ve ever had.

We met during primary school, 17 years ago. We grow together and there was a time that the more we got older the more we fit each other. In a surprisingly way. We knew each other very well. Whenever I needed help, I knew I could count on him, and vice versa. We were a weird team, we were exactly the opposite: I was colorful, he was grey; I was over-emotional, he was over-logical; I was positive, he was skeptical. But we worked. I had the best memory with him. I still don’t know why but our was a love-hate friendship. There were weird mechanics that were on that I still can’t completely understand and, I suppose, I will never do. Unfortunately, the more the years passed the more it got unstable. Now the story gets hard to tell, too complicated and full of unfortunate events and irrational reactions. Our friendship troubled several times and every time, after an argument, we get colder and colder. In the end, we were completely different from those two young teenagers, and our friendship finished. it happened almost 3 years ago. It hurt.

Even though there are thousands of things I regret, I have accepted the way things went and the fact that our friendship was over, simply because we didn’t fit each other anymore. I prefered not being friends anymore rather than being these kinds of strangers we were at that time. Probably it can be seen as an overreaction, probably it was, but I felt it was right because of the very strong connection we had had for more than 12 years. I’m not sure about what he thought about it. After that, we didn’t see or talk each other for 2 years, then I asked him to have a walk together 1 year ago and he accepted. Actually, I didn’t know why I asked him to meet. I missed him or probably I missed the both of us of years before. It was weird, because we both wear our masks, forced in our old roles, when we clearly were different. A thing I remember he said was that friendships like ours couldn’t end, but just change shape. I didn’t expect it. Also, I probably didn’t think so. We left promising a beer together in the future.

I haven’t spoken to him since that day. He went to live one year in Barcelona. He came back last August, a couple of weeks before I was living for SCA. A lot of things happened on me that year, I felt so different and I wanted to confront him and I wanted to know what happened to him. I simply missed him. There were no ways at all that we can be as friend as we used to be, but maybe he was right, our friendship could have found a new shape. But I felt that moment was our last chance. He lived one year abroad,new life, new mentality. Probably he was even more distant from me. I was going to move to London and live a completely rollercoaster life, my connection with him would have been weaker as well. There or never. It was my last time to save and maybe set a kind of we-met-once-a-year friendship before we were definitely too far and cold. So I messaged him to go out for that famous beer. He said “I will let you now”. Of course, he didn’t.

I’m not sure what I wanted to say to him then, I don’t even know what I would have said to him now. This homework whisps me to contact him but actually I tried 4 months ago and it was clearly too late, we missed the train and now we are thousands mile away. I am also not sure I want to meet him by now. We had our time and is something that now seems to be another life.

So I didn’t ask him to meet. I know we haven’t spoken for just 1 or 2 years, but from someone I used to see almost every day for 18 years, feel really long time. Rather than him, yesterday I meet a friend I hadn’t seen since I was 7 years old. We used to be neighbors. Actually, I think we were friend just for that reason. Otherwise, we had nothing in common. Now he is a barber and yesterday I went to his shop just to have a chat with him. It was quite tedious. Nothing really interesting. He told me he has a girlfriend and they live together. He still supports Rome football team and he likes his job. He asked about my life in London. He then had to come back to work. That’s it. Nothing that upset me. Nothing that made me genuinely smile. But I guess that’s ok. Maybe he wasn’t the right friend for this homework, was he?