Not changing is death

My best friend for a long time was my radio show partner.  We met when I began dating his ex.  That only lasted for a month and a half or 2.  She broke up with me and a few months later, ended it with him.  We slowly warmed up to each other, and I gave him books and we talked, endlessly.  B, his partner J, and I all decided organizing would be a good idea so we started working on an anti-gentrification anarchist volunteer project in West Oakland.  It went pretty bad.  I realize I risk sounding arrogant, but I almost never worry about my intellectual capacities.  There are plenty of people "smarter" than me, but I am pretty confident in my ability to read, understand, think, and create and imagine.  However, in this group full of leftists and psuedo anarchists I felt that I was not listened to at all.  It was a really strange experience.  Anyways, B and I grew out of this project because our ideas and questions were too big for it, we grew.  We started recording a radio show together that at this point has achieved what we could consider modest success.  We get more emails than we can easily respond to, and we meet people who listen fairly frequently.  All of this first paragraph is tangential though, because it is hard to talk about what is going on.

So, my friend C the other day told me that she thinks all relationships change at the 2 year mark.  She said people either grow apart or dive in and work at communicating.  I've been friends with B for 2 years.  We have both hurt each other, we had a brutal honesty policy for a long time, and things are hard.  I have felt at times that he talked about me to my ex S, which feels really painful.  I hurt him by hooking up with his new partner and not communicating well enough about it.  Now that partner is mad at me and there is a problem there.  The problem is that I am demonstrably NOT the person I was 2 years ago when B and I first met.  I know he has changed, but I have REALLY changed.  I committed to it, I wanted it, and I am getting it.  I am throwing good and bad out the window, I am less effected by other people's feelings, other people misunderstanding me, and I am more ready to tell people to fuck off if things are not working out.  In general, I actually respect myself now, I feel significantly less self loathing, and I feel the need to apologize less.  I say sorry when I mean it, but I refuse to say it when I don't. 


Pat the Bunny says that "forgiveness from those we hurt in this world never was guaranteed," and I agree.  However, B has been mad at me for about 3 months now, and I can't do much about that anymore.  I was as honest as I could be, and it wasn't enough.  I was accused of lying, manipulating, etc, and I honestly do not feel that I attempted to manipulate or lie once.  I was in a weird place when I hooked up with his partner, and I am not going to shame myself or feel angry at myself for taking a while to realize things that I probably would have liked.  I do wish I had never hurt him, because I hate seeing him in pain, but I refuse to hate myself any longer.  I will analyze my decisions and thoughts and feelings and try to act as I would like to be treated, but never again will I sit in self loathing.  I am different.  I am not a leftist any longer.  I am an anarchist, and that means something to me.  It means NO.  It means fuck you.  It means I am myself, whatever that is, and it fine.  It means no more excuses, no more denial, it means I am raw.  It means living a life of joy and pain and adventure, and constantly trying to be free in each moment.  I am different than I was 2 years ago, a lot different.  And I will keep changing, even if I have no idea what is coming next.  I don't know what this means for our friendship, but I do feel like I am seen as the person I was 2 years ago and not whoever the fuck I am today, and that makes it hard to have a friendship.  I'm sure the situation is a lot more complicated than this, but this is the best I can do about it now.