Rows Red

House stuff isn’t going well, not well at all. I am filled with a deep well of impotent rage and at the same time overcome with a sense of stillness and resignation. So, instead, I’d like to focus on something positive. Let’s talk about friendship. The “real friends don’t just help you hide the bodies, they bring quick lime and a wheelbarrow too” kind of friends.

Amy is effortless for me. She and I share several core personality traits, and that probably has a lot to do with it. We’re not fans of liquidity in the emotional sense, preferring things understood, and with clearly defined boundaries. She’s not afraid to “lay down the law”, and in fact we both use exactly those words to describe the same thing. She’s a take no prisoners kind of gal, and we can tear it up as a team, let me tell you. On top of all that, Amy is incredibly compassionate, far more so than I am. She’s creative, smart, funny, talented… all things I’ve said here before. She’s a rip roaring Bitch Goddess, and proud of it. She knows that life is messy, and awful, and heartbreakingly beautiful… and she’s not afraid of that.

Amy in the sun, at WOOL '09.

When I fell into the abyss of depression in a hardcore way, in my late teens, I stopped being a “phone person”. I didn’t have any girl friends, so aside from my parents or whomever I was dating, I fell out of the habit of the phone. Later, through the coupling of depression and isolation, the phone began to have all sorts of stigma attached. I began to feel like calling my friends was “bothering them”, or I just didn’t think of calling at all. The fact that few people called me seemed significant, more so than it was. It took years to make some kind of headway against that, but I still don’t know how to call my friends just to say hello and chat. I know how to arrange visits, but not how to pick up the phone. How strange to be this way, when in person I’m so over the top outgoing! Thank the gods for social networking, it helps people like me more than words can say… no pun intended.

Amy understands. She knows I think of her all the time, and miss her like crazy. She understands that I’m tough as nails and easily wounded. She knows that I would donate a kidney to her if she needed it. Amy understands that I need my space, but would reach out often if she still lived here in town. Amy knows I don’t need perfect, but I need an equal. Amy knows that I’m flawed, and I know she’s flawed, and we love each other anyway. She’s sure enough of herself that I can relax, and just sit back in comfort.

I know this because she calls me, like she did last night. She needed a laugh and someone to lean on, and funny enough, I did too.

Tags: Friends & Fun, Life & Stuff