I got the COVID booster shot some weeks ago. I also got a pneumonia vaccine. I try to keep up with being as protected as I can be. I call that being responsible.

A friend of mine was taking COVID seriously most of the past year. She got the first two shots. We have hung out a good bit until recently. Both of us live alone and have been cautious about where we go. I felt she was a reasonably safe person to be around. Now, however, she has had a change of views and I have been avoiding her.

She shows no interest in getting the booster shot. She knows someone who practices "alternative" medicine (not a doctor.) This person advised her not to get the booster shot. On top of blowing off the booster, she told me she's been thinking about making a trip to a casino. She misses playing the slots, which was a favorite pastime of hers prior to COVID. What she does is her business, but I don't want to chance getting COVID from someone who is less cautious than I am.

For a while I found excuses to avoid doing things with her. Ten days ago, I told her on the phone that I would be secluding myself more than I had been doing, due to the COVID surge. She got kind of brusque and sounded annoyed ending the call. I haven't heard from her since.

Normally she calls me a lot. I was used to hearing from her every other day. She gets bored a lot and likes frequent long phone conversations. I find plenty to keep me busy, but I would interrupt whatever I was doing to make time for her. In a way, I'm not sorry to have the frequent phone calls stop. I am a bit dismayed that she seems to have ghosted me over our having different views on the COVID booster shot.

I'm not sure what to do now. If she had gotten the shot, I would have gotten together with her to do some holiday things. I would have invited her to come by for dinner on Christmas. (I like to cook. She doesn't.) I feel like the ball's in her court. She's got a history of abruptly absenting herself from contact with a friend and, then, suddenly reappearing after quite an interval. (She's done this with others besides me.) Something about this behavior really has me disturbed.