What is friendship, really?

…Although friendships tend to change as people age, there is some consistency in what people want from them. “I’ve listened to someone as young as 14 and someone as old as 100 talk about their close friends, and [there are] three expectations of a close friend that I hear people describing and valuing across the entire life course,” says William Rawlins, the Stocker Professor of Interpersonal Communication at Ohio University:

“Somebody to talk to, someone to depend on, and someone to enjoy. These expectations remain the same, but the circumstances under which they’re accomplished change.”

From “The Atlantic Magazine”

Sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence. A time to let go and allow people to hurl themselves into their own destiny. And a time to prepare to pick up the pieces when it’s all over.

Octavia Butler

It seems to be coming to pass that I actually did let go of a long-lasting friendship almost a year ago, after an unfortunate and unnecessary exchange involving politics, which then spiraled into so much more that had never come to the surface, including deep-seated, hidden grievances and repressed anger. I’ll be trying to pick up the pieces for some time, or else I’ll finally move on and let those scattered pieces of a once-close friendship lie where they fell. Isn’t silence golden, after you reach this point.

Why did this happen? For one thing, in this bitterly fractured and polarizing time of angry political discourse, there has finally come on the scene a figure who is able to crack the sometimes tenuous bonds of politics and civility among friends and family, and tear apart our once inviolate closeness and commonalities that somehow held together amidst the most fundamental differences. Comity in the face of polarity was the norm, until now.

I occasionally go back and forth about whether to contact them and to pretend that perhaps our falling out was just a very unfortunate misunderstanding.  In some ways it was. But, it was also much, much more. My friend told me in a final email that although our differences were political, in this day and age politics covers so much ground that chasms of differences in that sphere, by default, exclude discussion of so many other topics we once long ago could freely discuss.

In the midst of all this , a quote from Thich Nhat Hanh pops up:

“Where there is anxiety, irritation, and anger in us, we cannot decide clearly what to do.”

I so wish we were not living in such terribly and dangerously fragmented times which are able to literally destroy the longest-lasting friendships. I’m still distressed and confused about all of this ten months later. Most of my adult life I have either frequently visited these two people, had brief enjoyable times together when we had moved to different cities, and, for a number of years at the beginning of the friendship had the deepest, longest and best conversations imaginable because we thought alike, but more important, as good friends should, we enjoyed each other’s company immensely. I had also been keeping in touch with them by letter or email for decades, even if years went by without much response, or any contact. This was even after he experienced some radical changes in personal beliefs and convictions, and espoused views that were totally the opposite of what we previously shared in common.  Also, it became easier to communicate via email and texting with the advent of the Internet, and while we occasionally emailed, we never used instant messaging, or later, texting. For decades I was writing and posting essays online, but none of that seemed to interest them. All of this should have raised red flags about flagging interest, but the overwhelming memories of those good times and conversations seemed to override any other considerations.

This has baffled me for many years, but we still were able to maintain our friendship and keep in touch. Apparently, not anymore.   At least as things stand now. This is so sad because, while I hope these developments are not permanent, I can’t at the present time think otherwise. It makes me question what close friendship really is, but at the same time, how very rare and precious a gift it is. When it’s gone, there’s a void that doesn’t go away.

The strange and even sadly humorous thing about all this is that everything I have written here probably exists now only in my head, in my vast and long memory vault, where I keep treasured memories of the past long after the expiration dates on them. My friends, who are the subject of this piece, have a huge family — sons and daughters and many grandchildren. I keep telling myself to please come out of the bubble I’ve surrounded myself with, and myself alone. I may be more than an occasional passing thought to them, but in terms of sheer available time to indulge memories from the past and thoughts of me, it surely must be folly on my part to ever think they reciprocate internally. Why would they dwell on a brief time in our long history that is now history itself, and we all know how history can be revised and our actions endlessly rationalized.

In short, I simply have more time to dwell on the past. I’m 72 and time is slipping away. I’m not going to apologize for these preoccupations of mine. Most people would have long ago moved on, but for me, that’s not in the equation, especially since I’ve only had a very small number of good friends in my lifetime.

I always thought the bonds of the longest, closest, and most intense friendships were nearly unbreakable (nothing is ever 100 percent), and that true friends, most of them, that is, will always stick with you because they know you so well and accept you for who you are. Maybe these special friends will. Lack of communication, though, may mean nothing much, or, depending on duration, may be the ultimate wedge.

I guess some of us, myself included, spend a lifetime seeking, or rather hopelessly trying to find, the perfect friends or soulmates, and we don’t always realize until late in life that we had found them once upon a time. I know I have.   For this I am forever grateful, despite the changed reality of the friendship.

What is a friend? To reiterate what William Rawlins said, “Somebody to talk to, someone to depend on, and someone to enjoy. These expectations remain the same, but the circumstances under which they’re accomplished change.”

As another old friend told me regarding this, “Everything in its season.”