Happy solstice. This is arguably my favorite day of the year...which makes it perhaps the best day to bid farewell to a friendship. No day is a good day for that, but at least this day's reluctant relinquishing of the sun allows me to feel that some light illuminates the loss, brightening the good moments and gently highlighting the flaws.

After today, I'm going to try very hard to put this whole thing away. I have a tendency to chew over the details of a fragmented relationship, trying to voice conversations that I wish I could've had, demand answers that probably don't exist, determine what I could've done to stop the disintegration. I do this for years. And for years, I wonder if I'm wrong, horrible, unlovable. Which, besides being melodramatic, tosses aside all the good moments in that friendship, all the hopes and joy I brought and took away from it.

The fact is, those people don't matter. Not anymore. They're no longer in my life---through their choice, or through the choices I've made---and none of my mulling and wishful thinking will change that. What I can do is hold on to the memories of that friendship when it was good, take them at face value without picking through them for hints of dishonesty and dislike. And I can note the things I've learned from that friendship. (In this case, if people dislike the Muppets, it's probably not meant to be.) And I can look forward to the next friendship and hope that maybe this time I'll stumble into someone with whom I can be myself---annoying flaws and all.