When the 'Ship Sinks

I'm not one for New Year resolutions; they often feel like a set up for failure paired with aspirational thinking based on a script of what we are supposed to want for ourselves: Lose weight, scroll less, eat healthy. I recently completed a ritual that required me to identify what I wanted to leave behind in 2025. I noted that I wanted to leave behind unintentional people, people who are careless with me, people who do not repair, and situations where I am undervalued. Being able to define these things comes from experiences with people who fell short but somehow still felt entitled to call me their friend. It can seem very obvious that no one wants unintentional, careless, non-repairing people who don't value them around, but enforcing these standards requires exercising muscles that are uncomfortable to flex.

As I get older, I find that I don't have the energy to react on the spot the way I did in my twenties. Sometimes I need a moment to process my feelings and determine how I want to move forward. Early in 2025 someone I considered a close friend posted a reel in a group chat shared with two other friends. The video was of a white woman flopping onto her bed and bouncing off to fall onto the floor. The caption? "When you can't drop your kids off for the weekend at their dads [sic] because you picked the good guy and you're in a loving happy marriage." I guess that's good for a couple of yuks and I have no doubt that was her mindset when she sent it, but as someone newly divorced who had to contend with a kid who disliked leaving my house to stay with her dad, it hurt. The message that divorced mothers have it easy by getting a "break" and leaving the kids with their dad, paired with the smugness of "I picked the good guy and I'm in a loving happy marriage," compounded with this message being passed off as a joke by a person who I'd considered a friend for decades? It fucking hurt.

I spoke up in the group chat -- gently at first -- with, "I admit, I don't get what's funny. As a now single parent it rubs me the wrong way." The response? "I'm sorry it rubbed u [sic] the wrong way."

Anyone familiar with an apology knows this falls under the "I'm sorry you were offended" category of non-apologies. The appalling part: this was the only other friend in our group that had experienced divorce, and she had also talked at length about the importance of impact vs. intent and identifying said non-apologies. I tried relating and empathizing with her, but found myself losing sleep over her response. I replied again, just after 3 a.m. "I have to say this. That's a non-apology. That's a "I'm sorry you got offended." I went on to say that I was hurt because she knew what I was going through and that it wasn't funny.

She did apologize sincerely, but only time, and observing if there is changed behavior, empathy, care and consideration, can help when deciding to keep letting someone in. Often we accuse people of holding a grudge; we tell them to "get over it." We use the sunk cost fallacy -- the years invested in a relationship -- as reason for them to "just let it go." We tell people to "be the bigger person." We gently shame the people on the wrong side of the equation under the guise of keeping the peace. We don't give much weight to whether someone is no longer in alignment with what we expect of our friends, and we also tell people to expect less from their relationships to spare themselves from the resentment of unmet needs. Why is there so much burden placed on those who are harmed? Why do we push for forgiveness while sparing offenders from actively repairing the damage they caused? Who does this benefit?

Over time I remained friendly, but felt guarded, and not eager to share much of what was going on in my life. I retreated from the group chat. Is this how it goes in adulthood? It's often summed up in a quote that some friends are with you for a season. The tricky part is understanding that even friendships you assumed would be life long will end in ways you didn't see coming. It doesn't mean the friendship was imagined or fake, but that its course has run. I'm sad, but sadness is not reason enough to compromise on how I want to be treated. This friend is the person who succintly pointed out that someone may not have a bad intention, but not having bad intentions is not the same as having good intentions; this was a groundbreaking realization that I had not considered. I didn't expect her to be the same person who would demonstrate this to me.

The defining moment was watching that reel, speaking up about it, receiving a non-apology, pointing out the non-apology, and then getting what seemed like a genuine apology. It felt like too much work for basic empathy and consideration from someone who knew me and knew what I was going through. Time has shown me that my trust in this friend is damaged, and there may never be a repair. This person was my roommate in my last two years at West Point. We didn't stay in touch during her first marriage but we reconnected early into her second marriage. I visited when she was pregnant, and she and her husband treated me to a walking tour of Boston. The morning I was due to fly out, she went into labor, and they still managed to drop me off at the airport on their rush to the hospital. The baby born the day I flew out is a college freshman. This was no short term connection, yet I no longer feel compelled to stay connected. I don't wish anything ill on her; I don't want a fight to clear the air. I want to shift my energy towards becoming what I seek in others: being intentional, showing care, being able to repair damage I've caused and valuing others. I'm grateful for the jokes we shared and the discussions we had, and I also recognize that "letting it go" can mean letting go of friendships that no longer feel safe.

Santa's Secret

Every year I ask my kids to give me a list of things they would like for Christmas. In the beginning it was a list to give to Santa, but both of them have long since aged out. My younger kid believed in Santa until she was about eight years old. I tend to think she wanted to believe at that point, because when her older sister pressed, her belief morphed into believing in the "spirit of Santa." We aren't religious, so the holiday wasn't centered on Christianity or going to church, but instead spending time together and exchanging gifts.

My younger kid had only one item on her list: an upgraded version of her portable gaming system, which had a fairly hefty pricetag. I struggled with this as unemployment means more money is flowing out than coming in. I told her I could get it for her, however she may have to wait until after Christmas.

Meanwhile, my older kid provided a lengthy list of not-too-expensive things. What I didn't expect was that the older kid would try to convince my younger kid to ask for an older handheld gaming system that isn't manufactured anymore. Later, in moments when my older kid wasn't around, the younger one would come into my room and share that she knew what her sister actually wanted: the no-longer-manufactured handheld gaming device. The device wasn't on the older kid's list, but her persistence in trying to convince her younger sister to get one served as a glaring hint.

When her dad asked if she wanted an updated version of her gaming system, she quickly devised a plan: she would ask him for the no-longer-manufactured handheld gaming device instead. My younger kid made quick work of looking up used devices and when she found one that fit her specifications, she sent the link to her dad. She intended to regift this handheld system to her sister while knowing that she would not receive her gift on Christmas. She could have easily asked him for her gaming system and moved on; she was more motivated to surprise her sister.

Given events that I won't get into just yet (stay tuned for that), my younger kid has not been eager to spend time with her dad. When he reached out to plan their gift exchange, she agreed to it, knowing it was a necessary step to acquiring her sister's gift. They went out to lunch, exchanged gifts, spent time together, and she came home, victorious. "She has no idea" my younger kid would say, as a sly smile spread across her face. She was so pleased with her cleverness and the use of deception for good.

I don't necessarily condone deception, however Santa Claus is an elaborate hoax that adults perpetuate year after year. My sister described a feeling of outrage and betrayal upon discovering the big lie, to the point that she spoiled the secret for me when I was only five years old. I could expand this to say the adoption of pagan traditions, and placing Jesus's birthday suspiciously close to the winter solstice on the calendar is another example of that deception, but that ground has been covered. So, the disclaimer is, deception is okay if it's done for good and ultimately does not cause harm.

In early December I opened a letter from my home loan company which contained a check compensating me for the excess in my escrow account. This amount was close enough to the amount of money I needed to buy the updated version of my younger kid's gaming system. A quick online search showed me which retailer had the best price and in minutes I purchased the new system.

We exchanged gifts on Christmas Eve, and even then, in front of her sister, my younger kid proclaimed, "She has no idea!" "And neither do you," I thought.

We opened our gifts. Weeks earlier, my younger kid handed her phone to her sister so her sister could read a text exchange between her and her dad. The younger kid nearly had a meltdown when she realized the link and discussion to purchase the haldheld gaming system were in the text conversation, and for a moment she worried that her sister had seen it. She hadn't. She was completely surprised by the gift and immediately turned it on and began toying with it.

My younger kid opened her gift and was also completely surprised to discover the replacement to her portable gaming system. I had never given her a time when she could expect to receive her gift, and she didn't know circumstances changed and I had some financial breathing room to buy it.

Sometimes these tests of character show up without any set up or orchestration. Learning that Santa Claus isn't real isn't the only shift in maturing at Christmas. Another shift is when kids are less excited about what gifts they'll open and more excited about giving a thoughtful gift to someone they love. My younger kid could have easily gone for the certainty of getting the gift she wanted by delegating the task to her dad. She was willing to postpone her own gift indefinitely and prioritized getting a gift for her sister instead. I would be dishonest if I took credit for her actions, and I don't know if the 14-year old me would have been selfless enough to forego a gift I wanted so my sister could get the gift she didn't expect and didn't outright request. As a parent, witnessing the evolution of a kid who was once excited to get gifts from Santa to one who was more excited to surprise her sister was the gift I never anticipated.