The Frenemy Post

I really, deeply want to wax retail about these Revas I'm admiring, and how my very act of purchasing them they will whisk me away to that mystical country club in the sky where jobs are optional but bellinis are not.  

But - but - my keyboard keeps coming back around, like a annoyingly persistent Ouija board, to a topic visited recently by Skiplovey:  the itchy Google finger*, and the frenemies who inspire its ill-advised searches.  

*By the way, I hereby declare that none of you may deny the itchy Google finger, because we all have one.  That is all.

[Edited to Add:  a similar tale of friendship woe was recently told by SLynnRo;  in fact, you may just assume if I've written something here, she has managed to cover it already in far more stylish, funny fashion.]

In my case, my Google frenemy was both a law school classmate and a former competitor in one of my childhood hobbies.  I recognized her in class one day & introduced myself, which led to a quick and close friendship based, I imagine, on the unusual number of things we had in common.

Perhaps it would be more accurate to say "the many things we had in common, but that she did far, far better than I did".  Of course, all of my close friends are extraordinary women and men, but this particular friend managed to push most of my insecurity buttons - yes, even I, Mistress of Haughty Superiority, have one or two - by her mere existence.  If I had a boyfriend, she had a much nicer one;  if I studied for an exam, she studied twice as diligently, despite having a natural aptitude I lacked, and did four times as well.  She was better looking without effort, was wealthy while being gracious about it, and had the Normal Rockwell-style family I didn't.  And so on and so forth  . . . 

Despite my lingering, perhaps irrational sense of imbalance, we continued as friends - until one day, unannounced, she stopped talking to me.  Tried and convicted in secret - especially ironic given our vocation - I was suddenly persona non grata, demoted from close friend and study buddy to less than zero, an object of silent treatment contempt.  It has happened to many of us - I'm ashamed to admit I've done this myself - but it took me by complete surprise nonetheless.

To this day, I have no idea what crime against friendship I may or may not have committed, despite my many attempts at the time to broach the topic.  At my wise old age of thirtyone , I now realize the justification is wholly irrelevant. Not to demonize the girl, but there were numerous indications at the time that this friend was anything but, including her equally poor treatment of a mutual friend. However, I have long forgiven myself having missed the signs in my early twenties, experience and age being the best teacher, hindsight, blah blah blah. 

What I have been less successful at are the attempts to lay off the Google.  I'm not talking everyday, bunny-boiling Google levels, but merely the once every year or so, "I wonder how X is doing?" variety.  And while a small part of me is admittedly irked that she's still managing to outlap me on the Life Resume Points stuff - it truly is remarkable how many of those overlapped in our case - the occasionally mature, bigger part fully realizes that the surface success doesn't define the whole in this case, not by a long, very important shot.   And that sort of insight is part of why I'm secretly grateful to now be thirtyone , wrinkles and all.

Who triggers your itchy Google finger?  Do you give in to the Googling or try to resist it? 

ETA:  I neglected to add that I Google exes as well, naturally.  I just assumed that was one of those inalienable human rights, along with the right to free speech and to wear Tory Burch, as listed in the Geneva Convention or something.  Right?  Right??