When I moved to Leeds in May 2000, I made a friend through work. Actually, I made a number of friends through work – I made more friends in that the six months in that job than I did in the rest of my (five and a half) years at the university combined – but for the sake of this post, I’m thinking about one person in particular.

We weren’t bestest-best buds or anything but we had a laugh together. He used to hang out in my office quite a bit during the day, we’d sometimes have lunch together in the department’s senior common room and we went to the pub together from time to time on various department-related outings or celebrations. After I left, we continued to meet up every couple of months at pubs or department parties and the like until, eventually, other stuff got in the way and we drifted apart.

About three years later, I was walking through the university at the end of the day, heading the back way into town to avoid the crowds, when I saw someone that looked like this person coming the other way up the cliff of steps. Given a few years had passed and the turnover of people through the uni is so vast, I wasn’t sure if it was him so didn’t say anything to be on the safe side. Then I saw him again on another two occasions in quick succession – same place, same time – and I realised it definitely was my old friend — but by then I thought it would be weird to say hello or acknowledge him because I’d essentially just ignored him the first two times. Of course, since we then passed each other just about every night for months, it was as equally awkward continuing to not acknowledge each other.
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