Saturday, March 27, 2010

I was thinking about best friends.

I had a grumpy day today. I suppose the whole day wasn't grumpy, but I found out something  that upset me early in the day and my mind kept wandering back to it throughout the day.

The spacebar on my keyboard has been testy for I-don't-know-how-long and I still have never gotten a new one. It isn't that it does not work, just that I have to hit it extra hard and sometimes it doesn't actually leave a space. But only sometimes. One would think, with the amount of things I actually type, I would remember to replace it when I was at the electronics store. One would be wrong.

That isn't interesting.

Last night was a lot of fun. Jeremy and I went to BW3's and had dinner and drinks. And then we went back to his house and watched a little Lord of the Rings with his mom before playing Rock Band until I could barely sing anymore. It was an extra nice night. Because if felt like breaking the routine that we had fallen into. Sometimes, even when you enjoy doing things, routine gets un-exciting. And the way he kept saying "one more song" made me feel like he didn't want me to leave when for a long time I felt like I always needed to make sure I left before he had to ask me to. That was a complicated sentence.

But it was more than that. Do you ever think that the greatest things about are a person are things they don't do intentionally? That the best things they ever say are things they probably don't even realize matter? Because I love that he does great things like open the car door for me even when it is pouring rain or buying me dinner even though we are both pretty poor or listening to me talk even when I know it isn't interesting to him, but the things I love the most are things I don't think he even thought to plan.

And it is that way with everyone. Like Ashley can say nice things if she wants to, but the things that mean the most aren't the nice words. It is that she is THERE. She calls me and she listens and gives advice and tells me things even when we disagree or I blatantly ignore her advice or I don't understand where she is coming from. She keeps being there when other people disappear. And that isn't contrived or done for award or recognition. It is who she is. And I love it.

And Christine can look at me from across the office and know exactly what I'm thinking. She knows how to word something just right in a little note to make me laugh when I'm upset. She complains about things that bother me too so I know I'm not alone in it. I love these things about Christine and she doesn't do them on purpose to make me like her.

Johnna teaches me how to be angry about things when I would let people walk all over me. She stands in my place and gets angry for me. And she somehow feels exactly how I feel even though we come from different places and walked different paths. And she puts up with all my gushy, romantic comments and dishes them right back out to me. She makes me feel connected.

Jaylene and Dennis are light-hearted and silly and kind. They make me feel better just being around them. Like life doesn't have to be so complicated. Like sometimes the point of the evening is to eat and dance and make jokes about kissing and poo and laugh and laugh and laugh. No one is playing "games" or all that under-the-surface-stuff. Just being young. Just hanging out.

Sarah R is spontaneous with me. Makes up crazy, ridiculous jokes and random activities. Reinforces the part of me that doesn't need to be girly and pretty to have fun and feel great about myself. She makes me laugh and satisfies the part of me that wants adventure. That hates routine. And she doesn't need me and I don't need her. We spend time together because we enjoy one another and not because it fills some need. Its okay if we don't talk for a week. No drama.

Sarah M makes me think of new life. All these things I've been missing out on. She's got the tattoos and broken heart to match mine and the sense of adventure to go along with it. She sent me a message when I was feeling lonely and didn't even know it. She invited me to come visit her in Columbus before I ever told her I just need to go somewhere.

Katy invites me along to do active things. Initiates it when I usually feel I'm dragging people along to go outside with me. She is all about cooking and eating and introducing others to healthy, nutritious food. And she wants to be green too. And her perspective is different enough from mine that I completely value her advice. I might still ignore it the way I do Ashley so often, but she helps me see from a different angle. She thinks more logically while I think emotionally. And our friendship feels so elastic, like it wouldn't break easily. (Ashley dear, OUR friendship is some kind of unbreakable stuff not yet known to man.)

And Krystal. I didn't talk to her for a long, long while. I can be quite an insensitive jerk sometimes with a killer run-away mechanism when things get uncomfortable, but she still talked to me again. But seeing her last weekend was like going back to a happier time. When we would laugh over silly things and buy dresses and hang out with the boys and go on late night walks and just talk and talk. Just being with her made me appreciate those days. Those nights.

I could keep listing. Going on with every person that I like. That I love. But it IS getting late. And this spacebar is no less testy. My point with all of this, however boring that segment might have been was this: The greatest things about people aren't the things they do on purpose, but the things they always are, unintentionally. Maybe I could take that lesson with me. I don't have to try to make people like me because, if others think similar, the best things about me aren't things I'm doing on purpose anyway.

I haven't seen much of my friends in the last couple weeks. I've been feeling unsocial I suppose. And when I did want to see people, things seems to come up. And when it is sunny and I'm not at work, I want to be OUTSIDE. But it left me feeling lonely at the end of the week.

Jeremy's best friend is Billy. And I told him yesterday that I don't have a Billy and it makes me sad. There isn't  someone whose house I can just show up at without invitation. Someone I'm so sure of I can take for granted that if they want to see a movie, they want to see it with me. If they have a crisis, they want to talk to me. If I want to hang out and do nothing, I can do it with them. Ashley is so far away. And I don't trust people anymore. I don't ask for things. I don't push things forward. I don't have a "Billy". But I do have a lot of people that I love and enjoy and I believe they feel the same way about me. And that will be enough for now. Until I find my other-half-girlfriend-person or Ashley and I live in the same city. Whichever.

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