Fragile creatures are we humans. After all what is needed to get us hurt? A faint laugh of ridicule…a harsh word…a smile not returned. Often do we fall down during our journey. Often do we get hurt. Most often we dust ourselves off and start again. A true friend, according to me, is someone who gives us a helping hand to get us back on our feet, pats off the dust from our back and revitalizes us for the journey ahead.
The world we live in is not as simple as it seems, nor is the millions of emotions that pass thru our minds every instant, what remains…what is perceived by us are not the tiny spots of black and white but the whole picture. No one is perfect. But sometimes these very imperfections are what make friends closer. These are the very black spots that make the picture beautiful. A friend is not necessarily the best person around, but they are those around whom we are the best. We don’t really choose our friends, we just fall into company. We may know a lot of people, but there are indeed few around whom we are really comfortable.
They needn’t be the most entertaining, or the most compassionate person. They needn’t even be of the same age group. Sometimes friendship really is a means of escape. An escape from the problems at work or at home. An escape from the harsh, inescapable realities that hound our daily lives. A chilled beer with a group of really old, close friends will do more good at times like these than any advice or words of sympathy. There are two kinds of friends-the present ones and the old ones. The present friends are those with whom we interact on a day to day basis. We often depend on them for help with our problems and help them with theirs.
They are those with whom we spend most of our time with. They have a great influence on our behavior and our outlook towards society and our lives. Occasionally fights do tend to occur between even close friends. There is nothing like a good, really intense fight between friends to examine the strength of their friendship. Fights are indeed the acid test as far as friendships are concerned. Those which live thru them live on, closer than before, with a new found vigor. Above all, present friends are those whom we take for granted. There is nothing like their absence to remind us of them.
We never really realize how many friends we have until; somehow, we are made to part. Old wine and old friends are the best, or so the saying goes. There really is nothing like the reunion between old friends. Their sudden presence is what makes our hearts leap. They bring with them the memories of the old days. There really is no better antidepressant. The warm hugs you exchange on meeting, the of things long thought to be forgotten suddenly spring up in your conversation as if it just happened yesterday, reliving those embarrassing moments that nobody else knows…really, nothing like it. Man is a social animal.
Even today, one of the most terrible known forms of torture is solitary confinement. The pity is in the fact that there are people who inflict this dreadful torture on themselves. They confine themselves in prisons of their own minds; refusing to come out. The invisible shell that they have surrounded themselves with, though imaginary, is impregnable. Somebody said, the lock to heart’s door is within. Who are our true friends-those few whom we let into our secret worlds and shared our joys and sorrows, our most private sentiments, and listened to theirs-are not actually decided upon by us. They just come…good friends.
