Friendship

 



An old friend of mine called me to talk about her fringe friends, the ones who she only talks to a couple of times a year and sees even less.  She wants to drop them and worries about how she is going to do this.  (She hates to hurt anyone.)  She says she wants to concentrate her efforts on real friends.

I told her I don't agree.  Maybe it is because I don't have many real friends, but I value everyone who cares enough to keep in contact, even if it is only once in a very long time.  You never know who your real friends are until you have to call on them to do something slightly out of the ordinary.  And, the people you consider real friends often are only there as long as you are useful to them. 

I'm not bitter, just realistic and certain recent events have shown me that some of these "fringe" friends are the real friends, the ones that care the most.  I am happy she has lots of friends and can clean out the ones on the edge.  As for me, I'm glad my spring cleaning never included the people at the borderline.