In my first year, everything was a new experience. Every party felt magical, every coffee catch-up was a revelation, and every friend felt like they’d be around forever. Then came the second year — the year of trying to recreate that magic. My friends and I masked our longing for the past as ‘traditions’, repeating old nights out and inside jokes as if they were sacred rituals. I started to mark time not by seasons, but by which tradition was coming up next. And with every repeat came a quiet comparison: where was I last year? Who was I with? What did we laugh about then?
But then the box office ratings of my series must have tanked, because suddenly the writers really upped the ante. By season 3, I wasn’t in that same friend group anymore. The traditions no longer belonged to me but to the people in my rearview mirror. The shift was seismic. I started to see myself from three angles: who I was when it started, who I tried to be again, and who I am now. And the space between them made me feel like a time traveller without any perks.
This week especially hit hard. The uni elections, the ‘kermis’, Eurovision — the same week every year. An excellent tracer of time. All week I was coughing up comparisons and my nose was blocked with nostalgia. It’s funny how our brains crave consistency, repetition, only to realize that people don’t repeat. They change. They disappear. They move on and you weren’t invited to the housewarming party.
With friendship breakups, the most closure you get is seeing them attend a party you weren’t invited to
They don’t write songs about it. There’s no 10-minute ‘Taylor’s version’ for platonic heartbreak. Society reserves all its sympathy for romantic breakups. You just quietly become strangers who still follow each other on Instagram and pretend that’s enough. But it stings.
And it’s so quiet, too. Platonic breakups rarely explode. They dissolve, fizzle. It’s the slow death that gets you. But what really makes my blood boil, is the politeness of it all. We think we’re so mature, but there’s no closure and no accountability. With friendship breakups, the most closure you get is seeing them attend a party you weren’t invited to, posting a photo captioned ‘found family <3’.
Ouch.
And it’s not always dramatic. Sometimes people just… grow apart. But let’s be real: losing a friend feels like losing a version of yourself. They’re gone. Still alive. Still posting. Just not yours anymore.
Since we won’t be invited to the upcoming events, let’s propose a toast now. Here’s to the friends we no longer text but still think about when we hear the songs of bands we saw live together. May your group chats rest in peace. And cheers to memories that can’t get deleted for storage!
CARLA ERASMUS