It is a cheezy quote but at this point, it worked for me. The discussion was about friendships that had come to an acrimonious end, to add context to the quote.
"Friendships are like actual ships. Sometimes they sink."
Recently there has been such use of the phrase "BFF" that it is has fed into the idea of having the same friends for life, which is actually rare. I think that has been one of the more difficult lessons to learn as an adult.
Friendships, like romantic relationships, change, grow, or become stagnant. Sometimes it is just about timing: two people being in different stages of life. Sometimes the friendship only serves a specific purpose for a specific time. Sometimes, if we are very lucky, our lives remain in synch or we are able to change & grow together instead of apart.
Sometimes there are outside forces affecting the relationship: mental illness, drug use, simple geography. I've experienced all three and have only found myself successful with the change in geography.
Friendships can become more difficult than romances. The joys just as high and the losses just as low.
One hopes that even if there is a break in a friendship that somehow, some way, sometime, there may be a reconciliation. Addicts & the ill can receive treatment and the internet has rendered geography nearly powerless. Bide time is all that one can do. Wait.
Wait and if the friend is a true one, they will return in whatever capacity that they can. You can return in whatever way that you are able.
If the friend does not become a true one then it does not erase the relationship, it only ends it. They were still your friend. The emotions and memories still exist and still serve a purpose. You are still better for knowing that person.
Sometimes there are outside forces affecting the relationship: mental illness, drug use, simple geography. I've experienced all three and have only found myself successful with the change in geography.
Friendships can become more difficult than romances. The joys just as high and the losses just as low.
One hopes that even if there is a break in a friendship that somehow, some way, sometime, there may be a reconciliation. Addicts & the ill can receive treatment and the internet has rendered geography nearly powerless. Bide time is all that one can do. Wait.
Wait and if the friend is a true one, they will return in whatever capacity that they can. You can return in whatever way that you are able.
If the friend does not become a true one then it does not erase the relationship, it only ends it. They were still your friend. The emotions and memories still exist and still serve a purpose. You are still better for knowing that person.
But oh! the blessing it is to have a friend to whom one can speak fearlessly on any subject; with whom one's deepest as well as one's most foolish thoughts come out simply and safely. Oh, the comfort - the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person - having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain together; certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then with the breath of kindness blow the rest away.
~Dinah Craik, A Life for a Life, 1859
~Dinah Craik, A Life for a Life, 1859
1 comment:
So true, so true. It's nice to be able to ebb and flow with someone, to pick up where you left off even if when you left off wasn't in the recent past. Those friends I value.
Post a Comment