I was thinking about the whole idea of making friends, this evening. Not exactly sure what brought it up -- I was keying in some stuff for work, and found myself musing about this blog, and the couple of people that I've corresponded with, briefly, as a result.
You send your child out (Go out and play) and you tell them to 'make friends'. And they do, with an effortless style that only the most self-assured of us can do, once we pass our twenties. They have fights and spats, and they announce that 'I don't like Zoe any more', who was her best friend last week. You nod seriously, while thinking 'kid stuff'. But most of the time, they just do it - they just go out and meet people, make friends.
I've never been much good at that. I hear of people who still keep in touch with people they knew in high school, who are members of organizations, who are not spooked by the idea of getting to know new people, and I wonder: how do they do that? Its not that I stay at home, and hide in the closet. And its not that I am spooked by the idea of talking to people I don't know: I delight when the opportunity comes to talk to large groups, because it's something I'm good at.
But making friends -- one on one -- well, as Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott said in quite another context -- that's hard.
2 comments:
I hope that it does last. I have two friends who I met online, one of whom I've never met, and one whom I met once. The one that I met once is fading rapidly -- never was that good at responding, and now, two years later, does it very rarely, and the one I never met is just about incommunicado. (There's a word I don't get to use very much!)
Making new friends takes time, but is as easy as commenting on a blog you like. ;)
Keeping in touch with friends can be a completely different story and something that takes a lot of time. At least for me. But it's worth it!
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