Friends
I remembered when I was a little boy and had friends who were leaving town to go to another school. Being the naive and emotional me I was pretty devastated as I was losing lots of friends. I also remembered the conversation I had with my dad as he sought to put some logic into the so called friendships and friends. He mentioned (which I have taken to heart) that friends come and go. They will always be a chapter in your life but you choose that chapter to define you and the relationship with those friends. You make new ones and you will in the course of growing up loose friends as well. This is life and this is how things tend to work when we grown up. Expectations on friendships are somewhat more delicate unlike marriage which is a bond that binds two parties legally. Friendships on the other hand are not legal - It can be destroyed, amended or do nothing!25 years later, as one plunges into a career or starts a family or move countries (instead of towns), the tendency to be caught up with the day to day activities means that one spend less time with friends. Some one in your younger days could have been best friends but could be a virtual stranger today.
University friends would be probably the best of the lot as this phase in your life defined the person that you will start to grow during adulthood. These friends party with you and they have seen the worst in your drunkard behaviours, share your sorrows with relationship issues or trying to get that deserved job.
Then there are friends who were made in the course of your working life. They help you grow (or destroy - in other words, your sworn enemy) in your career and provide a solid network of resources to tap in the next phase of your life. Some of these friends could be friends till the end of time.
Looking back at all these different phases in my life, I have made many new friends, some of whom I cherish fondly. Some I have let down and disappointed. The friends that I have made are now a handful and if we do keep in touch it would be the yearly customary visits or monthly/weekly drinks at the local pub. Some how when I compare my peers, I seem to be the odd one out when it comes to friendship. Still single all these years and desperately lacking of female companions, I seem to have gone into this little world of mine that is focused mainly on three things - work, myself and the family. Somehow friends are not the priority. As a result of this, keeping in touch on my side is very slack, very inconsiderate and somehow I deserve the cold shoulder or silence I get from my friends. I have asked myself many times whether it is me that is the problem? I think so.
It is the time of the year again to take stock of the year gone by and think about how to live in the new year. For 2007, I want to cherish my friends, old and new and be good to them. Life is too short and uncertain to just do nothing about friendships. Who knows what will happen at the end of the day?
posted by Maximus Leo @ 1:55 AM
2 Comments:
To me friendship is the most important thing. You don't choose your relatives, partners come and go, colleagues may be with you only for a certain purpose, but real friends are next to you at all times. It's worth giving them a chance, but to the real ones, not the ones that we just go out for a drink.
Yea, I also believe in the same principle. Real friends are next to you all the time. Not necessarily physically next to you all the time, but they are there when you need them.
Some how, even when you do not see them in years, and if the chemistry is there, real friends will launch into a "real" conversation, instead of just asking - how are you, how's work, and how's life? Real friends share problems, tribulations, triumphs, happiness as well as sadness.
Real friends go all out to help when their help is needed, and they also do not expect anything back in return. They give, and provide, without any expectations. Sounds academic, but well, I have experienced that, so, I write from experience. Miracles have happened to me in the form of friends...I hope it will happen to you too. :)
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home