like a bell in my ear

"Until you walk a mile in her crocs/uggs/reefs/converse... it’s really not fair to assume anything."

I'm thinking of a friend lost. Or, maybe it's the friendship more than the friend. Or, maybe something else all together. The ending of it was mutual, although I felt rejected at several points.

I was mad for a while, then resolute. Now, today, for some reason I cannot fathom, I feel sad. I feel sad and severally rejected, and the above quote really rang like a bell in my ear. I did not walk in her shoes and she did not walk in mine.

Perhaps this is how many endings come about.

I thought I tried, I thought I was bridging the gaps between where we both came from and who we wanted to be. But that bridge was rickety at best and I invested far too much in it. In the end we may never have even seen each other's shoes, nor thought to look, and ultimately we found ourselves standing in very different places.