Be a better friend

The last few weeks I’ve been spending time on the phone with friends instead of isolating. I’ve even had the opportunity to hang out with a few.

my old friend who loaned me a bathrobe so I could attend a retreat (where I started to hook up with the woman who is now my wife) messaged me (after 20+ years). He’s done well for himself, and works locally.

what have I started by making this commitment?

Synchronicity strikes. On Thursday I got an invitation from one of my old college friends (who played a role in introducing me to my wife) to link with him on a professional network. I don’t think I’ve heard from him in 20 years.

Coincidence? Or should I start looking over my shoulder?

The day after I added this goal, J, my old office mate and partner in mischief, madness, and magical mayhem, called me up. That is mighty nice of him, because I have not called him more than a few times since he moved out of state. He’s headed out this way on business and wants to hang out with us for a weekend.

synchronicity: when the conjunction of this, that, and the other thing line up with your stated intent to make you keep looking over your shoulder to see what else the Universe might have in mind.

between illness, family crises, my own depression, a career switch. It’s coming up on three years since I moved back to my home town and I still haven’t gotten in touch with my best friend since 3rd grade (photo). I don’t call my other close friends.

Can I still call them friends? I suppose I can call them anything I want … after all, they call Magister George W. Bush “President” as if he’d actually won an election and had not consistently acted to destroy the constitution he’d once sworn to protect and uphold.

But, in protracted times of difficulty, it’s so much easier to conserve energy, to stay in and not go out, to watch TV instead of having conversations, to fail to reconnect to the links of community.

What I’ve lost the most is being social. As an engineer, I thrived getting away from the computer all week long and interacting with people during the weekends. Now, as a therapist, weekends have become a time of retreat. Of not going out. Of speaking little and listening more. Of quiet pleasures.

But I miss having friends actively in my life.