Thoughts on Friendship

 

A real friend is someone who helps you keep your balance in an unbalanced world. The texture of the relationship they bring to your life may be fine or coarse, subtle or broad. Sometimes you don’t realize the import they have on your life until after they are gone.

 

For most of us, real friendships are rare. Modern lifestyles seem to leave little time to develop anything more than superficial relationships. Ask yourself how often in a day you actually exchange a meaningful sentence with someone.

Occasionally I meet someone and think, it would be really interesting to get to know them better. Then life moves along and so do we.

We should rejoice in the few times in our lives when we actually make a real connection with someone. But even then, we get so busy with our cell phones and virtual worlds, that we often let relationships stagnate.

This Christmas, one of the great gifts you might give yourself, is to take a little more time to foster your friendships. The internet, or something like it, will always be there to provide the cold comfort of life, but this season is a good time to remember that the soul also needs a little care as well. And the warmth of human relationships is part of what fills the need.

If you are lucky enough to have some good friends, take a moment this season and thank them for traveling this earth with you…and especially for being willing to put up with you.

Glenn K. Currie