Friends, What Are They Good for Anyway?

I often run into a social phenomenon that constantly astounds me every time it occurs. I have met quite a number of people since I left my not so small town of Nampa, ID; and many of them have quickly become "friends." We spend a fair amount of time together, do various activities together, and act like we have known each other our entire lives. Then, for varying reasons, we don't see each other for a while (life gets busy, moving to a new apartment, etc.) whatever the reason, we lose touch.

But then, we run into each other and one of the first things I hear from their mouth is, "why haven't you kept in touch," or something to that effect. I have never understood this. Why is it my sole responsibility to maintain the friendship? Since when has any relationship survived thanks to the efforts of one. I have never seen it happen. And, to set the record straight, I have often made attempts to invite the person to a party and maintain some form of contact with them since the long "absence" began.

So, I would like to suggest that perhaps we think again about why a friendship really ended. We may even need to ask ourselves why the friendship ended at all. Perhaps it has nothing to do with the fact that two people haven't seen each other in a long time, but perhaps one of the two have stopped putting forth the effort.

I would like to present one example for your consideration:

I am an avid ballroom dancer and compete on an individual basis with a partner. One particular partner I had became a good friend and we often did various activities together or would go to parties with other friends we had in common. We shared many good times, and then came the break. Over the course of a couple months of not seeing each other due to varying circumstances, we ran into each other, (I should mention that we had stopped competing together by this time) and the usual conversation took place.

We decided to get together and catch up on the time we hadn't seen each other. I set up the engagement and we had a good time. We then a period of several months only running into each other on rare occasion and with little time to talk, despite frequent invites I had extended to different social gatherings. At this particular meeting, my friend decided that we should get together and catch up, I agreed and told her to contact me with specifics on when and where she wanted to meet.

Well, needless to say, she never called. I was tired of putting effort into a one sided relationship, and so I let it fade. To me, our friendship obviously meant little to her and other priorities took precedence, so I stopped trying.

Now, you can analyze this experience as you may, I don't really care. All I wish to convey is that we think twice about why friendships die, and maybe pay more attention to those who are extending an extra effort to maintain those friendships. We meet lots of people throughout our lives. Faces are constantly entering and exiting, so I shush to pose a single question: Are we really keeping track of the ones we really want to keep there?