Friendship

Lately this word keeps coming up in my mind for some reason. I find myself asking what does it mean to be a friend to someone. Gone were the days in primary school where we'd argue with our friends and end with a threat like "I don't want to friend you anymore..".

I find as the years go by, that friends change. Like KF said, in form One, we use to be close friends, and wrote in a book together, and called ourselves GIB ( Girls In Blue) with Sookie and Prashna. Over the years, due to different classes and friends, we grew apart. However, I thank God I was still able to keep in touch with Sookie and KF by writing letters to them and leaving it at their desks :) It was fun, and when I look back at it, I don't know how the genius idea came about, but it was what kept us in touch all those years..

Now, about 5 years after high school, we still keep in touch :) And I must say, these two girls, along with Siva, who is from my primary school, are the ones that I've been keeping in touch with for the longest period of time..This is what friendship is about. Sure we have had our arguments, our ups and downs, joy and despair. But these things bring us closer together, not further. I thank God for these people, and for the wonderful memories we have shared together, be it at birthdays, outings, movies, arguments.. If life was a long piece of white paper, among all the pictures on it, these people would be some of the ones who enhances the beauty of my life with their colours. This appreciation also goes to Lalitha, Darling,Jien, Nisha, Jenn, Siew Lee, Shuba, Shien, Jonathan, Elaine ( i love the sheep *hugz*), Mei Foong, Wen Chyi, Joy, some of my seniors ( Yeh Ying, Steven, Boon Ser, Yan Ching, Andrew, Dot..), and the many others whom I know in my heart..

When I find myself dealing with people who have all sorts of characters and personalities, some which I don't agree with at times, I am reminded to reflect on what being a friend means and what are the responsibilities of a friend. I'd like to think of a friend as:-

• someone who knows when to be silent and let you do the talking, and do the listening
• someone who encourages you to do the right things and tries to talk you out of doing the wrong things
• someone who shares their laughter and joy with you despite the circumstances, and especially when you're down and out, offering to comfort you when you need it
  
• someone who calls out of the blue and is able to spend a few minutes asking you when you're free to meet up so we can catch up and after that end up spending a nice afternoon talking until the waiters give you a wary look
• someone who does not take advantage of you and is completely fair in small things like paying for meals
• someone whom you know you can tell anything to, and trust that person not to publish it the next day on the daily newspaper
• someone who, when knows you have an issue with another person, attempts to make things BETTER instead of adding oil to the fire
• someone who loves you and accepts you for who you are, always praying for you, and totally honest ( provided you know how to accept and deal with the truth...)
  
• someone who sits quietly beside you as you sob and cry your heart out, offering you comfort and encouragement
• someone who is willing to apologize when wrong, talk it over calmly and rationally with you, and willing to listen to your side of the story and discuss it together
  
• someone with whom, despite sitting down with you and not saying anything, and yet when you get up and walk away, you feel that it was the best conversation you ever had i.e comfortable silence between two people
  

No one is perfect obviously, but sometimes, it is the principle we have in life towards treating other people that helps us be that friend in time of need. Someone once simply put it as something like "friends are the ones who lift you up using their wings, when yours have forgotten how to fly.." (that's from you, wen chyi!). True friends are hard to come by these days. Not everyone gets along well with everyone else. It takes effort to open up to other people.

However, despite the complexity of it all, I've learnt that despite the disappointments in life, I have to just move on, and let go to God some friendships, struggle to keep others afloat, and work on strengthening others. It is the trials that make us shake, but coming out of it together strengthens the friendship more each time. There are lessons to be learnt each time someone comes along in life because the world is full of different characters and personalities. Just have to learn to give and take along the way with a cheerful heart. Ultimately, God is the best friend any man can have.

Friends do leave all kinds of foot prints in our hearts. It's just a matter of what kind of foot prints we'd like to leave in theirs.

biblical wisdom on friends:-
"A perverse man stirs up dissension, and a gossip separates close friends."Proverbs 16:28
"He who covers over an offense promotes love, but whoever repeats the matter separates close friends." Proverbs 17:9
"Do not make friends with a hot-tempered man, do not associate with one easily angered, or you may learn his ways and get yourself ensnared. " Proverbs 22:24-25