Who are they?

Your friends, who are they? Your real friends. Family doesn’t count and don’t come to me with stories of how good your relationship is with your father, mother, brother, sister or anyone who shares the same last name or is somehow blood related. Go ahead, count them. Got a number? Ok, now let me tell you this:

If you think your friends are the ones that have so much in common with you, who will agree with you in all things and all the time, boy I’m telling you, you’re in for a big surprise. It might sound funny after what’s been said in the first paragraph but, you’re real friends are just like your family. They will fight you, argue with you, disagree, from time to time even upset you but the important thing is they are there for you. In your darkest hour, when everyone else turns away from you, they will be there. They will tell you to your face “You really screwed up this time!” just to complement with “Let’s see how *WE* solve this mess.”

For them, there is no wrong time, there are no ‘buts’, nothing is too much or too difficult. They will be there for you. They will tell you what you need to hear when no one else has the guts to do it, even when they know you’re not going to like it. As someone said recently, they are like bitter medication. They are the family you get to choose. So, choose carefully.

I can count on the fingers of one hand the friends, real friends, I have. And though I wish I had more, I know it’s not that easy. Good friends just don’t ‘happen’. They cannot be bought and cannot be made in a couple of weeks.

Now, that said. Who are they? Your real friends. Count again…

And to my friends who might be reading: Guys, thank you ever so much.

…

It was 2:15am and I had just put my instant messenger on “away” mode. As soon as I switched off the lights I heard the usual sound of incoming message. I was really tired but you know how these things are, right? Wouldn’t hurt to check the mailbox one more time, wouldn’t hurt see who was calling. Wanna take a guess?

J. It was her. The message was simply “you there?”. Well, I could, or perhaps should, have pretended not to see. Next morning I would just send an offline message saying “Sorry! I wasn’t”. But that would be so mean. And honestly, it’s not like I hate her and never want to hear from her again. How could I possibly? I spent 4 years with her. I learned a lot from her and owe her a lot too. If the thought of avoiding her crossed my mind, it’s just due to the realization that we are not meant to be together. So, why insist?

Anyway, the heart gave in, the brain was already halfway asleep, so I ‘chatted’ a bit. All the usual stuff: “How are you? How’s work? Have you been travelling? You haven’t sent me my post cards.”… So on and so forth. Nothing ever changes. I could feel she was very meticulously trying not to scare me away by saying something stupid while steering the conversation towards her real goals, whatever they were. Confirmation came when she asked “But, honestly, how are things with you?”.

I know her too well, you know? It’s a side effect of intimacy. The real question behind the question was “Have you found a girlfriend yet?” or “Are you still alone and maybe unhappy?”. You know where this was going to get, right? I had too much of that already. Providence come to rescue me by dropping her connection (may God bless dial-ups) before I could reply. So I set my IM to “away” again and headed bed without looking back.

This morning there was an email from her sister in my mail box. It said:

“Hi, how are you. When are you coming back to visit? We all miss you very much. Sorry, the line dropped. J is asking you to call her. Love, Fa.”

I didn’t. And life goes on…