Friendships

I've been corresponding with an acquaintance about the nature of friendship. After one particularly dire email from him, I felt compelled to rhapsodize about relationships. Unusual for me to take such an optimistic slant to such things, but every time I re-read my response (I've read it a few times, hopefully not with an egotistical impetus) I believe more strongly that it's all true. I thought I'd share it:

I am fortunate enough to have some local friends I can count on for face-to-face time and affection (I am the annoying sort who insists on hugs and kisses hello and goodbye, somewhat out of a sense of my cultural upbringing, somewhat out of the enormous pleasure I get from physical touch). But it is difficult to find people with whom I want to spend a lot of time, and I have grown comfortable living on my own and being my own company, and I do find great comfort being on my own in my own space with my own thoughts and no need to try to explain my (sometimes crude) behavior. I do have a number of acquaintances for whom I have a sense of affection, and whom I find enormously entertaining (and for whom I believe I am a source of entertainment - I certainly have a role to play in their circle: the bawdy, brash, confident, highly sensuous woman who always has a ready wink and an innuendo to share. It's a I have made for myself and into which I slip comfortably when asked).

Today I've had some time to write down a lot of my thoughts, which have been centered on the nature of inter-personal relationship...and one of my more obnoxious conclusions was that I wish there was something as easy as economic theory that could easily be applied to how we approach relationships. Something along the lines of the fact that we can predict market response based on a select number of indicators and usually we're pretty close to actual market response. (Right, econ is not easy for most, but it's a philosophy/pseudo-science that tries to predict behavior based on fundamentally irrational human nature, and it seems to satisfy the need to understand human behavior in context of money. Why shouldn't it explain something as irrational as friendships/relationships/love?)

The two friends of whom I wrote are irreplaceable. They will always occupy a place in my life, they have already for many years. The nature of the place they occupy may certainly change, as it has over the years. But the fact that they are important to me has been consistent. To what degree and in what capacity they are important may change. I am no longer the most important woman in my one friend's life; that
role belongs to his wife. And the nature of his love for me over the years has changed, and it will continue to change (most likely becoming more purely platonic and I can imagine it decreasing in potency); my love for him has undergone dramatic changes, but it exists and barring some horrific incident where my love turns to indifference, I anticipate it enduring 'til I snuff it. My best friend Aleza has been a constant, despite the irregular communication, for more than half my life. I believe, earnestly and with conviction, that we will always be friends. Granted, we both make better efforts to keep the lines of communication open in these past few years, but there exists a sympathy between us that matures as we get a better grasp on life. I hope that sympathy continues to deepen and I do intend to see to it that I put forth that effort.

That being said, I don't think they exhaust my capacity or my need to care about someone else, or someone new. My need for closeness is not anywhere near
being sated. I've never been convinced that I had a limited capacity to care, and that I would have to divvy it up between a certain number of people and that my love for someone would diminish because I'd acquired a new friend and now they needed to some portion of my affection. I don't believe in a quantity theory of love. I can't. If my love were predestined to only grow to a certain amount, then that means that I am limited in everything. My potential, my understanding, my ability would have a preset limit...I would be bound by some finite number and infinity would cease to exist for me. I refuse to believe that. It comes back, again, to the nature of economics and the concept of making a bigger pie rather than having to reportion the pie.

There remains vast space for more people to care about. I don't know if I could ever
dispense the love that I want to be able to generate. But, one dose of reality continues to mar the perfect sentiment: my love may be limitless, my time, however, is not (a phenomenon everyone else also has to cope with...).

I hope that I won't create boundaries to friendship in the future. Friendship, without the component of romantic or erotic love, doesn't hurt. Friends fulfill needs, no one friend will fulfill all needs, and I think because it is impossible for one person to be all thing it makes it easier to accept those so-called "short-comings" that people in friendships create. Friendships of a riskier nature are a completey different topic.

I am also fascinated by the circumstances in which friendships end. I have several stories about my experiences with that. I am guilty of cutting people off without explanation. Twice in my adult life. There were immediate and distinct reasons why I cut them off, and I admit, I did not think about their feelings. I know it hurt them; I've also been cut off without explanation. I licked my wounds and tried to figure out why I'd been shut out (by a group of mutual friends, at that, all women). I still wonder what it would be like to run into one of them and gauge their reaction to me now.

But here's a question: how much effort do you spend to try to maintain friendships? I know that sometimes my laziness (distraction, preoccupation) puts the blame of extinguished friendship squarely on my shoulders. I've realized it takes effort, and yes, I am hurt that sometimes people don't see me as worth the effort... I've also realized that sometimes I'm scared to reach out and try to create something with someone new. I'm timid that they might reject me, or that I come on to strong, or that when I stop playing the entertaining, comic Ghela and become the more philosophical, quiet, reflective and observational Ghela that I might put them off - they might only enjoy one aspect of me (which is truly rude on my part, who the hell am I to assume what they like or don't like, etc.). And I realize it's my fear of rejection that dampens my enthusiasm for new people. And if I'm lucky enough, I set that aside and ask someone else for a little time and interaction in the understanding that it's going to require a little risk on my part to see if there is some mutually
satisfying relationship that can be built.

But again, I hate to think that I'm low enough on the totem pole that someone would rather sit in front of a telly instead of calling me up for a coffee or shooting me off an
email (I'm giddy when I get little messages that say "thinking of you"...).