I don’t judge the quality of my friends by how long it has been since I’ve seen their face or talked to them on the phone. I don’t decipher how good a friend is to me by what they do for me. I don’t hold it against my true friends that they have lives, families, responsibilities, jobs, and then just want a day to relax and maybe even sleep. It’s called growing up.
What does decide how good of a friend you are is how often you include me in your life just because you want me there. Not because you need me. I want to be the person you feel comfortable talking to and I want to be the person you think of to invite over for dinner. I want to be the person that makes your life a little better because we care about each other. A close friend is someone you don’t hesitate to share things with, to be truthful with. You worry about hurting their feelings but never at the expense of being honest. A good friendship can handle disagreements. It’s a person in your life that is there for you to lean on and talk about life’s trivial and hard things with. A friend is a living, breathing, vault of a journal that should offer you support, great memories, and self-reflection.
There are so many types of friendships that you can’t put the same expectations to each person. There are those that ask you over to show their new home, some for dinner, some jump on a plane or surprise you with visits. You’ll have the friends that text randomly because they know you haven’t had the freedom of a ride and wind in your hair. You’ll have the friends that will always listen to you rant and offer you not a single word. You may not see a certain person often but when you do it is as if you never spent a day apart. I have a friend that gets annoyed that I never pick up the phone but still leaves me lengthy voice mails to fill me on their life; They still call.
To me, those are all examples of a friend that has intertwined its’ way into being a part of my family. We may not talk or we may disagree from time to time, we might not have time for each other for months but it won’t keep me from spending time with you when we both get the chance.
What I don’t have time for…
Those people that only call me to drink a beer in a smoke-filled bar. The people who only want me in the room because it’s one more person to make them look well liked. I don’t want the friendship where they put in just enough effort to be able to still ask favors from me without feeling entirely guilty. For those people who only want to talk to me because it’s going to be about them. That person they’re looking to hang out with isn’t me. They just want -someone- and that person isn’t me.
Sometimes people grow up in different directions and that’s okay. Sometimes the friend you thought someone was going to be, isn’t what their capable of or want to be. And that’s okay. It’s life and I’ve accepted it rather well.
So thank you to all the friends that I love dearly and who remain close to my heart. Even if we have not spoken recently, please know that I think of you often.
Life throws us curve balls and sometimes it takes a moment to recuperate but afterwards it offers clarity. I would rather downsize what I have and have quality over quantity.
Written by Tammy Layton
March 16, 2014
Unrefined Life Adventures 