On The Friendship Frontier

For the moment I am hanging out at the friendship frontier. It is a spot in my mind that I not go that often anymore because I have not always have got that much time to go there. In most cases I end up there because 'friends' make me bursting into that spot. And when I am standing at the edge of the border and wondering where to put a person, what label I am granting him or she I feel a bit out of tune. Because I then also face the fact that I have to miss many friends.

Like most of us I have got friends close by and in far of places. Some of them I hardly ever going to see and there are some even who I might never get to see. Because they just wish to stay alive in the Tweet-form. But lately I miss my friends that are not on Twitter and who are not very close by. People who are not active on social networks or not post that many pics on their Facebook account.

Through out the years I have made many friends and also lost a few. Sometimes it happens because time just catches up with you. You seem to lose each other out of sight and life treats you different in some aspects. This then creates gaps and some of them you can't seem to cross over anymore. You become strangers and in a way that is just the way life goes.

It is almost a painless act. For a split second you might realize one day that you have not seen,talked,mentioned, wondered about and many more acts about this specific person. He or she vanished out of your daily vocab and seems not to be worth the attention. Quite a natural act because life does that to you.

It happened to me a few times to me also in a rather painful way. People then just openly told me that the friendship is over. It is then you suddenly become very aware of the fact that even friendship is fragile and does come in many shapes and forms. I am a sensitive person and I care so that makes me also rather a vulnerable person. Not that I then started to fight back and try to make clear to these people that they were making a mistake.

Lately am very careful when it comes down to friendship. I do not trust anybody that easily more then a year ago. I learned my lesson quite well on the friendship front. And I am also finding out the hard way that you have to miss your best friends many times more then you have them close by. For the moment many friends!! Some of them don't live that far but others I need to board a plane for in order to see them.

I MISS THEM and I never know when we will meet again. Because time plays tricks on us and the future might take us even further apart. I have now friends living all over the globe and I feel very happy for them that life has been treating them well. I just wished for the moment that I had my own private jet. That when I am desperately in need of a heart to heart with a friend being over in a different time zone I can be there in no time. Now I sometimes have to settle for the answering machines and Facebook walls and to be honest that ain't just not good enough.

The ones I have close by I just don't tell enough that I am very grateful to still wanting to hang out with me, putting up with my complaints and other less fun mood swings and much more less funny moments that you might have second thaughts about being friends with me. Sometimes I wonder if I am out there hanging over the edge of the friendship gap! ;-) I can't just put down in a few words what you all mean to me.

'Hom-pom-pom', is humming Wolf, 'Hi Lamb. What a nice weather?'
'Homof', knort Lamb
'Realy weather for being in a good mood.', says Wolf. 'Hom-pom-pom.'
'Humpf.', grumbles Labm. He is sitting at a little table in front of his house.
'Are you in a bad mood?', Wolf asks.
'Yes,' says Lamb? 'Because of this letter.'
On the table there is lying a sheet of paper.
'What kind of letter?', asks Wolf.
'My letter to you,' says Lamb.
'For me?', yells Wolf. 'Awesome! I never get mail. Never ever.'
'No. Because you won't even get my letter,', says Lamb.
'What a pitty,' says Wolf. 'Why not?'
'It does not work,' yells Lamb. 'Beacause I can't write.'
'No,' says Wolf. 'Then it won't work. What a pitty about my mail.'
'But I do want to write that letter,' screams Lamb. 'Because I do know what is in that letter.'
'What does it say?'
'Dear Wolf,' says Lamb. 'I write you this letter. Because I am very happy.'
'No,' says Wolf, ' you aren't. You are angry.'
'First I was happy,' says Lamb. 'Don't talk in between my letter.'
'Okay,' says Wolf.
'I am happy,' continues Lamb, 'because I will see you later. Or I will you see you a bit later, in case I won't see you later. But I do see you today. Because you are here. And I am here. I like it when you are here.'
'What a nice letter,' Wolf whispers.
'Realy?', wonders Lamb.
'The nicest letter I ever got,' says Wolf.
'Realy?', asks Lamb.
Wolf takes the paper from the table.
'This letter I am going to keep, Lamb,' he says.
'Realy?', asks Lamb.
'For the rest of my life,'says Wolf.
'Hom-pom-pom-pom,' is humming Lamb. 'Do you notice what kind of weather it is today, Wolf? Nice weather, ain't it? For sure weather for being in a good mood.'(source: 'Brief' by Ben Kuipers, 'De kracht van woordjes 2', p.22-23)