I had the distinct privilege this weekend of going to Scottsdale, AZ to officiate the wedding between two of my oldest internet friends, Pix and Quin. Pix is the DM for my Dar na Theria game, where Ancelyn Blackstone, dwarven cleric of the goddess of song and secrets, is discovering that she can’t be strong for everyone. We haven’t played that game much recently (something something planning a wedding), but it was still delightful.
All of the members of that campaign were there except the two most remote (Rades and Llanion are both Canadian, and could not travel to be with us).
We laughed, we played a ridiculous monster heist D&D one-shot. It was amazing and beautiful and I felt so very very loved. They are my people, even if I was meeting some of them for the first time.
I flew home this morning and discovered that the friend that I was paying to care for my cats… hadn’t come to care for my cats. He “wasn’t feeling well so he guesses he forgot.” The cats had no food and water when I got home. This person has a key to my apartment, and I’m pretty sure that I don’t want them to anymore.
Add to that the fact that the other local person who has a key to my apartment for emergencies hasn’t responded to my texts to even acknowledge them the last three times I tried to reach her. So I’m trying to get that key back as well.
So here I am, having just spent three days surrounded by amazing friends, only to come home and be completely failed by the friends I thought I had locally. It’s an odd sort of feeling, and one that I’m not sure I know what to do with. I need a few people to be able to get into my apartment in case of emergencies, but clearly the people I have chosen can’t be trusted to do that anymore.
I’m hoping some of my grove mates will be able to step in and fill those roles. But until then, I remain distant from my friends. There’s a funny meme that went around awhile ago about where your friends live, and about how most of them live in “Fucking Narnia or Some Shit”.
It feels especially true tonight. My friends all live in a box on my desk, and that’s pretty lonely.
Thankfully tomorrow night I’m going to go play D&D with Josh, and Josh, and Ken, and the Caravan of Misfits will continue for as long as we can keep our squishy butts alive. The guys are becoming friends, and I appreciate them, even if I roll my eyes at them a lot. They’re real though, and so is the Grove. I just have to learn how to make friends out of the people around me.
(Also I’m totally hiring a professional pet-sitter for my next trip. I’m tired of having this happen, and I’d rather pay more to have someone with ratings and reviews and who if they don’t do their job I can fire and get someone else without being mad at a friend that I like.)