Friends

My friends and immediate family are the only things in this existence that I value. But whereas my parents, brother and sister are pretty much stuck with having to like me, my friends have willingly chosen to do so. This might not seem a big deal to many people, but it is all-important to me.

I’m not the kind of person whom others generally go out of their way to hang out with. Hell, even my friends rarely call me- I have to call them. I’m never the center of attention or the leader of a group. I am not good at being cheery and appropriate. I’m not affable. I loathe small-talk. I’m not going to pretend to like you. Let’s face it- I’m not an easy friend. I’m fiercely independent, overly-opinionated, bizarrely passionate (I recently broke into tears while futilely trying to convince a friend that Yoko Ono is a brilliant singer), inappropriately hyper, stingingly critical, annoyingly honest, offensively perverse, incredibly incredulous, frustratingly logical and undeniably selfish.

And yet, occasionally, someone chooses to befriend me.

Understandably, I’ve never been a person with a lot of friends. I went to an elementary school with 18 kids in my class, but none of them would have qualified as anything other than acquaintances. Growing up, my friends were imaginary and my sister. It wasn’t until I moved after sixth grade that I first starting hanging out with peers. Throughout junior high, Bryan, Erik and I were inseparable- well except that Erik and I became jealous of each other because we both wanted to be Bryan’s “best” friend. But after the beginning of tenth grade, when Bryan got himself expelled, I spent most of high school alone and confused. I’ve often dwelled on the fact that I had no friends then, but in truth, I did know a couple of great people and even had a girlfriend. It’s only recently that I’ve realized that during that time I consciously avoided associating with the majority of my peers in order to protect myself from being “corrupted” by them.

It wasn’t until the second semester of my sophomore year in college that, for the first time in my life, I met a group who let me into their clique and seemed to enjoy me just being me. A few years after that, I met another group of people with whom I became extremely close. Around 2000, much of my surprisingly large web of friends and I decided to leave Iowa behind. I spent six years in the San Francisco Bay Area, where I hardly made any friends. Were it not for that experience, I might have never realized that living in a great place and pursuing one’s dreams were not nearly as important as having friends nearby.

I moved to Portland to be close to old friends, and upon moving here I immediately made new ones. I feel blessed to be surrounded by friends. In two days, I will be spending Thanksgiving with a few of the people I am most thankful for.

In the coming weeks, I plan on using this blog to try to show my appreciation by sharing my thoughts on and stories about my closest friends. Don’t worry- I won’t use last names.