To Contact or Not to Contact?

A Caring Bridge site for an old friend was forwarded to me along with a copy of a prayer from a mutual friend of ours the other day.  I had not heard from this person for a very long time.  So I went to that site and read some of her journal entries about her cancer and how she is dealing with it.

This woman and I had been very close friends from about junior high school through college and after.  I met her through my best friend.  Their respective mothers had sent them both to golf lessons, probably in the hopes they would be able to hold their own on the golf course which would no doubt make them better prospects for meeting men.  They both bonded through their hatred of golf and their anger at their mothers for continuing to try to make them suitable husband-catching material.  For a while the three of us were inseparable spending every waking, non-school hour together.  Ah, good times.    

After college and bad marriages, this woman and I roomed together for a short time until I re-married.  For some reason (to this day I still don’t know what that reason was) she suddenly stopped talking to me.  Things got very unpleasant in the house where we were living, so my fiancé and I found an apartment and moved in together.  Our mutual friend refused to tell me what the reason was and insisted I work things out with her on my own, but that was very difficult because every attempt I made – sending birthday cards, Christmas cards, and letters – were met with silence.  Eventually I gave up.  That was 21 years ago.

A few months ago, her old boyfriend called me to tell me that she was very sick and had asked about me.  He gave me her address and I sent flowers and a card with my cell phone number and said that if she wanted to I would welcome her call.  I didn’t want to bother her and wanted the communication to be on her terms.  Perhaps I should have called her but I didn’t think I could handle the rejection, and from the sound of things, she was too sick to speak to me.  Again, it was met with silence. 

So now, I have her email address and her other contact information and I have a choice.  Do I reach out again and call her and deal with the rejection, or do I wait until she responds to the posting I made on her journal guestbook?  Will there be a rejection anyway?  I guess I just will have to gather my courage and do it.