Bowling and Boys

Tonight I spent the evening with my younger brother. My younger brother and I have not always had the best relationship. I do not know if it is mostly my fault that we do not get along, or his, or if it's equally our faults. He can make me so mad and upset that I hardly ever really want to be with him... The one thing that we both seem to have fun doing is bowling. He happens to be an awesome bowler for a fifteen year old teenager. He's already been able to bowl about three 300 games. Me, well my average is barely 100 I think.... Tonight I decided I'd take him bowling because when we do go bowling together he is really fun to be with, and I needed to just get out a do something tonight. When I am upset about things there is just something about going into that particular bowling alley because it kind of feels like I am walking into a different place. I get into the zone of bowling and the atmosphere of this alley that helps take my mind off of things that I do not want to think about. I focus all my frustrations on hitting those pins down, and even though I am not that great at bowling, there is something therapeutic about using all the force you can to aim that ball at those pins and then hearing them when they get knocked over, it's so cool. Not to mention when you have the perfect music going in the background also makes it more easy to focus when bowling.
Tonight though was not a night where I could escape from all my problems....While there we happened to run into an old friend of mine, one of whom I do not really talk to anymore. I'll see him occasionally when we do something with both his and my family like pitch-in dinners or something, but those happen about once a year or so. It was a surprise to see him. It made me sad though, because he was once a huge part of my life growing up, and now, well, we're more like acquaintances. We've talked about how we've grown apart, and I told him how I felt like he kind of cut me out of his life with no explanation whatsoever. Usually when I see him, I tend to be the one to come up to him first and say hi, and I can never tell whether he's missed me at all as a friend, and so I've stopped being the one trying to make plans with him. I just got tired of being let down by this guy. The last time I saw him was at his little brother's graduation party, and when I found out he was coming that night I felt the need to have a drink just so I could hide how annoyed and frustrated I was with him. That night he told me he wanted to hang out with me more, and I looked at him and I told him I missed him too, but I was not going to be the one to call and make plans with him anymore. I told him if he really wanted to hang out and become friends again he had to be the one to initiate it. Well months have gone by since then and I have never heard from him, so tonight when he was the one to come over and say hi to me first I was shocked. I did not even notice he was at the bowling alley until he did come over and tapped me on the shoulder. Being around him tonight reminded me how much I do miss him, but I still think after the way he has treated me these past few years he has to do the work to get our friendship back. I realized that we do not even know who the other person is anymore. Both he and I have changed so much in the past three years there is no way he is still the guy I knew in my freshman year of college, and I am no where near the same person I was back then either. I do not know if we ever will get back to where our friendship was, but I did realize something tonight. In the past few years I have had some "trust" issues when it comes to getting close to people. I have been afraid to let my guard down and get close to other people because for some reason I've had this nagging fear that they would eventually just kind of leave me in the dust without any reason at all. I've come to the conclusion that a huge reason for this fear has to do with this guy, which is stupid. I should not let one guy, who was just a friend, hold that kind of power over me. I think realizing this tonight has given me some clarity which will hopefully help me get over the hurt this old friend has caused.