Tonight I learned that my friends, who had been dating for 6 years total, engaged for a year, have split up. It was pretty shocking for a few reasons. First of all, it just sucks. It sucks when your friend ends a serious relationship, especially with someone they planned to spend their life with. Secondly, it sucks because it happened to two of my friends. I was friends with both parties before the two got together and I could never imagine having to give up my friendship with either of them. That being said, they live several hundred miles away, so we didn't have the opportunity for weekly poker games that might regularly bring up this awkwardness. More importantly, what do I say to them?
What happened between them is their business and I respect that. It seems that they reached a point where they realized that getting married would frustrate them more than make them happy. That is a tough decision to come to, no matter how much you know it's the right thing to do. I'm so proud of them for being adults and figuring things out before going ahead with a wedding, as I'm sure a lot of people do, with the divorce rate being what it is today. I love them both, no matter what. No party fouls here!
So where does that leave us, the friends? One of my friends pointed out, they seemed like a sure thing, a "role model" of a couple that gave you hope you could have something special. My mind immediately went there too, to a quote from a season 6 episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer when Xander leaves Anya at the altar. Buffy and her friends try to make sense of the situation and she says, "I thought they were my light at the end of the tunnel. I guess it was just a train..." So if this is what being a grown up is like, I wouldn't mind going back to being a kid for a day.
