February 3, 2012

  • terrified.

    I've tried to find a friendly, conversational way to start this entry, and I've given up. I'm talking about friends tonight, and I'm going to be as honest as humanly possible, within the constraints of relative anonymity. I've written here before (several times) that I value one quality above all else when choosing friends - loyalty. In general, I don't really care who you are, what you've done, or where you're planning to go next, as long as you understand that human bonds are formed because individuals believe in one another. That's all I ask from people in return. Meet me wherever I happen to be at, and join me there. You don't necessarily need to stick around, but always be willing to come back if I might need someone else to walk a few miles with me and tell me what they see.

    I have a friend who I met through tremendously odd circumstances - we weren't close at first, and it took time to forge even a small bond. But soon after we began to creep past those initial steps of casual interaction, I was hit with a personal family tragedy, and this friend jumped to my side without a moment's hesitation. That was all I asked, all I received in return, and all I needed. Even though this person proceeded to systematically destroy a decent portion of that trust, I still can offer them the benefit of the doubt (and accept the sincerity of their apology) because when I needed them, they were loyal, and I've had the opportunity to return in kind. Honestly, this analysis sounds highly simplistic, and much less circular or elaborate then some of the strange discussions I find myself delving into through these pages (if you will), but I think that makes sense based on my worldview. To me, friendship doesn't have to be complex. My closest friend on this planet is Matt Norris, and to be perfectly honest, we have almost nothing in common. But I trust him, completely, because he has never given me a single reason to doubt that trust. He is loyal to our bond, and I hope I return in kind. (We even kept each other at number one on our respective MySpace top 8, even through multiple fleeting high school relationships - now that's true loyalty on display). 

    My point is this - friendship is worthless (or at least significantly less valuable) if it doesn't involve self-sacrifice. If you want to be my friend but remain emotionally detached from who I am and what I struggle with, you're wasting my time. A friend exists not just to grieve with you - they exist to grieve for you, or celebrate for you, or laugh for you. They are an extension of you, whichever you that may happen to be on a particular evening (or early morning, as seems to frequently be my case). Friends forgive one another, they laugh off stupid mistakes and argue until it reaches the point of sheer stupidity and no one can remember the source of the initial anger. Marriage or long-term partnership is at its very core, a story of best friends - people who see every possible flaw in their life partner and love them so much more passionately and ornately because of it. Friendship is this very bond (without the sex, generally); this idea that people's flaws can make them better and not worse, and we should celebrate and promote the idea that mistakes and irresponsibility are just a manifestation of a willingness to take chances. 

    Let me connect these two diverging thoughts as my final muse for this brainstorming claymation of chaos and pseudo-intellect. People make mistakes, poor choices, and bizarre, irrational decisions. Every single person has made more of this type of decision than we can possibly account for. The point of friendship is to embrace these mistakes and form bonds because, in reality, we all have the same flaws, just expressed differently. My inability to understand or recognize the consequences of my actions are the same as your lack of recognition that your words have hurt people, deeply. My blindness to the reality that sometimes life moves on without you is the same as you turning deaf ears to people telling you how much they want to be by your side. We're selfish, stupid creatures sometimes, so let's take that one thing we all have in common and let it galvanize and energize how we weave amongst one another. It's abstract and erratic, yet particularly and unusually simple. Instead of worrying too much about walking in someone else's shoes, just try walking next to them in your own shoes. You'll get a better perspective, and there's always strength in numbers.