Walking out; walking in
February 22, 2010
The past year hasn’t been easy. I’ve lost a lot: a job, faux friends, been blindsided by something that in retrospect I should have seen coming and had some wildly in hindsight amusing health scares. I’ve been pondering the casual meaning of the way we use the word “friend”. I find myself reflecting on the word and narrowing my scope of meaning.
Perhaps it is because of the growth of ever popular social networking sites, blogs, texts, etc, that as a society we “feel” we know people better than we probably do. Somebody the other day told me they considered me a friend. I was thinking, I don’t know if you are left handed or right handed. I’m not sure why that suddenly bothered me: but it did. I don’t toss the friendship word around. I might toss my time around, being nice to people around (shouldn’t we all be a bit nicer?) but I’ve learned over the past year to weave my inner circle tighter.
I was accused of being callous and not being open. This person didn’t know I was unemployed; for almost a year. Maybe I am jaded. I am not the person who is going to trust you with the keys to my car because you look trust worthy. I’ll give you the shirt off my back: but I’ve been burned by letting people into my inner world. I can help you move, watch your kids or bring a meal over. Maybe I’ve been kicked in the face one too many times to just trust people because they say they are trust worthy. Maybe because I’ve recently seen the impact of gossip by adults against other adults and the painful, painful impact it still leaves. Maybe because I’ve been kicked to the curb by people one too many times because I wasn’t “cheerful” enough. (Because people who know me ascribe that adjective to me on a regular basis. . . ).
And yet, through all of that reconnections have been made. It’s interesting to see who walks back in and who only appeared to be there – only to kick you to the curb when you were no longer useful.
