Should I Stay or Should I Go?

"It is so nice when you can sit with someone and not have to talk." Just not in this context.

When I was twenty two, my best friend dumped me in a Pret A Manger on Oxford Street. It was February, and bitterly cold. It was one of those minuscule Pret’s where the tables are an inch away from the queue. You feel as though your conversation may as well be amplified through a megaphone for the rest of the cafe to hear. I was clenching a Pole & Line Caught Tuna & Cucumber baguette (side note: top tier sandwich. I ate the same one during the 2021 London Marathon and used it as a baton to cheer on the runners including Grammy nominee Carrie Hope Fletcher and my friend Hannah). She sat opposite, listing the reasons why I didn’t make the cut for her “new life”. It was an out of body experience and came out of nowhere. We’d been friends for years and talked regularly, and yet here she was, requesting I only contact her once every six months like a contact lens postage scheme. Anxieties were drifting through my brain in slow motion as I tried to process the conversation in front of me. After about fifteen minutes of observing her talking and holding still a wobbling lip, I decided I had to make a decision: should I stay or should I go? I’d booked a ticket to see a play at the Pinter Theatre. I may have been upset, but I was still cultured.

Friends are an absolute essential. They are there to listen, to cheer, to tell you when you’re being over dramatic and when you’re being a bit of a prat. They are our chosen family, our perfect pick-n-mix. We don’t need many of them, just a few that will stick by us. Like the wind, you can’t always see them, but you bloody well know it’s there when it’s making your hair stick to your lip gloss.

The friends I do have are fab. The best ones are subscribed to this newsletter (lol). I’ve got different friends for different things, and they’re dotted all over the place. One is a spicy red-head from Essex and is the human embodiment of a bubble bath. I feel sorry for those of you who don’t know her! Another has a head full of golden ringlets and brings out my loudest laugh. My friend that lives down the road is the equivalent of eating my five a day - good for me! There’s also a lawyer with a fabulous wardrobe who feels like a comfy pair of slippers. One is an IKEA fanatic, and I wouldn’t change her for the world. My sister is the best kind of friend because no matter what happens, we won’t be able to get rid of each other. We have no choice but to get along. I sometimes feel like her pet. I won’t expand on that.

On that solemn afternoon in Pret, my immediate feeling was hurt and shock. As the dust settled, however, I remembered that nobody is obliged to be my friend. To be honest, by sitting me down and telling me frankly how she felt, she was doing me a favour. I was in no state to be carrying dead weight - I could barely carry my weekly shop back to my flat. Friendships take effort and commitment. It works both ways: if someone only wants to be your friend when it’s convenient for them, are they worth being friends with at all? A therapist told me once that if someone upsets you, it’s usually because they’ve done something to you that you wouldn’t do to them. Friendship breakups are really sad and difficult - especially when it’s with someone you’d pictured at your wedding.

Instead, treasure the friends that do stick around. I would never want to leave someone feeling how I did that day, snotty and sore-eyed. Immediately when I came back from London, my friends took me to the cinema to watch When Harry Met Sally and eat pizza. An Everyman cinema, so I knew they really cared. It could have been so easy to spiral and feel sorry for myself, but they didn’t let me. What I’m saying is, it’s okay when friendships run their course. Don’t keep anyone around who doesn’t value being with you. Try to leave people better than you found them. Don’t leave them in Pret A Manger. ❤️