Friendship.

 

Friend, n: A person whom one knows and with whom one has a bond of mutual affection

Levels of friendship:

1. A friend will help you. 
2. A good friend will help you move.
3. A very good friend will help you move and dispose of a body.

Hopefully, none of my readers will have friends at the third level, unless they work in a hospital or mortuary.

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Over the years, I can easily say that I've had a handful of friends in the second category.  And I'm pretty sure that at least one of them might have upgraded themselves to the third category if the need arose. (This potentially gives a whole new meaning to having a "Skeleton in the closet." 😁 )  But as we get older, it gets harder to find a level 1 friend, much less a level 2 friend.  I think this truth is behind the growth of meetup.com - most of us crave human connections, and we will do almost anything to get them.

Sometimes, people will battle over friendships.  Other times, people collect friendships the way others collect stamps.  I've seen people do unethical things when friendships go sour.  But I won't dwell on that now.  Instead, I'll focus on the power of friendships.

One thing I learned by being widowed, was that the one person I could lean on to cope with a situation was no longer there to help me in my time of need.  Good friendships can end with that same problem. Some people are lucky enough to have more than one good friend to lean on in times like these.  And yet, when I look at MWL, she still is affected by the loss of some of her friends in her age group.  (No, I'm not going into any details about her here.  I'm just making a quick comment on how the loss of friends can affect a person.) 

For many of us, we lean on our friends as much as we lean on our families.  They help us out in times of need.  They listen to us when we need to process our feelings.  And they provide targets for us to show our compassion for others.  In the case of many of us transgender folk, we often bond with other transgender folk, as we are the only people who understand what we are going through.  I consider myself lucky to have been able to keep most of my friendships so far, as well as keeping on good terms with my relatives.  This may have been the biggest miracle of all....