There are a lot of things that can cause a person to leave your life. Sometimes it’s some deep and unforgivable bullshit that goes down that causes you to dislike or distrust the person and cut him off. Sometimes one person has enough and pulls a disappearing act. Sometimes life and circumstances just get in the way and before you know it you’ve lost touch with someone you used to speak with on a daily basis. As the saying goes, people come into your life for a reason or a season and not everyone is going to be there for the long haul. But sometimes people leave your life without really leaving. Has this ever happened to you guys? You have a relationship of whatever kind with someone and it’s totally cool and then all of a sudden something changes. You don’t know how it happened or what it was and it’s sometimes so subtle that you can’t even pinpoint when it happens but all of a sudden this cool as shit friendship or relationship or whatever is a little…off.

At first you think you’re imagining it. Or you explain it away as the person having a bad day or an off week or something going on in her life that’s affecting her. Because it’s someone you’re cool with, you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, want to consider every possible explanation for his weird behaviour before you confront him. But as time passes, or incidents occur to which the person’s reaction is wildly different from what you’ve come to expect from them, you eventually realize that something has definitely changed. You don’t know what it is, but you know it has. I like to compare this phenomenon to walking around a room you’re pretty familiar with. You don’t know it like the back of your hand, but you’ve been in it enough times to know what’s good. You know the layout, have a pretty good idea where the doors and electrical outlets are, you can find your way around. And then suddenly the lights go off and you’re in that room in complete darkness, fumbling around trying to find everything that was so accessible just a moment ago.

Having a friend or a lover abruptly turn out the lights on me has to be the all-time most frustrating thing ever. It’s happened to me four times in my life and three out of the four times the relationship was never the same again. Now matter how much time passes, now matter what answers or explanations are eventually given, no matter if the lights are turned back on as abruptly as they were shut off, In my experience, relationships of any kind are rarely able to recover from something like this. That might just be me though – after having gone through it three too many times, I’ve lost the inclination to regain what was lost once the person recovers from their dramatic moment and starts acting normal again. These days when I recognize that it’s happening I just go ghost because I don’t even want to deal with it – my anticipatory retaliation, if you will.

To me, turning off the lights on someone is about the ulitmate in selfish prick behaviour; but again I think my perception of it might be influenced by my past experiences. I mean – life is dynamic and fluid right? Sometimes they way we think or feel about someone changes against our will and it’s only natural that our behaviour toward that person would change as well, right? And maybe sometimes people turn off the lights without realizing they’re doing it. Or maybe they realize it but aren’t able to articulate why. And is that such a bad thing? I don’t know, but maybe you guys do. What do you think, my dear readers? Has this ever happened to you or is it just me? Have you ever abruptly changed the way you interacted with someone you’re close to without knowing or telling them why? Is this a bitchass move or part of the natural cycle of life? Speak on it in the comments.