Lessons in Friendship

Earlier today, I was speaking to an old friend of mine from back home. She railed against the fact that I hadn’t been speaking to her as much in my second year at University than I did in my first.

There was nothing astonishing about that, frankly. Seeing as I had taken up more extra and co-curricular responsibilities for my own good in a year which counts for 50% of my degree, I was indeed clambering the peak that is time with marked unease – coughing, spluttering – barely managing, but still.

The part of our conversation that struck me, got me thinking and eventually led me to writing was how she said that I don’t need her any more. Be advised, this is no romantic attachment that might be referred to implicitly or even explicitly. She went on to explain her assertion, saying that I did not need her any more because I had more people now. More people to talk to, she said. Therefore, she alleged, I did not talk to her.

Before proceeding further, I should clarify that I consider most – if not all – writing product of a moment(s) of profundity. Here, I risk trivializing the art, consider me reckless.

Her words, themselves, did not really form an affront to me. She was right. I knew she was. I knew she was right because, even before this seemingly dull colloquy with my dear friend, I had always known that relationships are always forged out of a sense of ‘bankability’, trust – faith, if you must – and a certain confessional attitude that has become acceptable between the two concerned individuals. The more of these sort of relationships you form, the faster you tend to – but not always – move on from your past ones. A phenomenon that is very simple and very real.

What was it that struck me then, you may ask?

I feel it was the realization of this particular phenomenon happening to me. That perhaps, it was I who had forged more relationships and was more inclined to moving on ‘talking’ to other people than ‘talking to her’. That I, now, had too many options to choose from and had forgotten that, once upon a time, I had established this one connection too. It was then that I felt the truth of her words. It was then that I spoke to this idea first, like Charles Dickens would to a ghost, before it explained itself.

Perhaps what I am saying here is that sometimes it is all too easy to move on from old friendships to new ones. To find some one else who is willing to listen to you, to help you knock that chip off your shoulder. But for something like that to happen continually, you need to sustain your friendships, cherish them. So that when you have that talk again, you get that same old complete satisfaction, that old sensation of sheer lightness.

It is my thinking – admittedly, not very profound – that if one is able to sustain all his old friendships he will continue to develop new ones, in an ongoing cycle that is characterized by mutual respect and return.

So thank you, dear friend, for teaching me this invaluable lesson.