Deep Thoughts for a Saturday!

The best friend concept is very interesting to me, but only because I have one. I lived the first sixteen years of my life without a best friend, moving from one unsuspecting bystander to another. And while I still am a self-described “friend whore”, I do have a life-long best. M is my rock, the only stable thing in this neurotic and volatile life of mine. My senior year of high school it was A, at one point at UM it was J, then there was C, but M is the crem del a crem, not to be topped in the foreseeable future.

Relationships in NYC are, in my opinion, way more complex than in any other city in the world. Everyone is moving at a fast pace and we (most of New Yorkers) don’t have the luxury of hopping in our cars and jetting to our other’s place for a quick chat, chuckle and/or cumfest. Even friendships here are seemingly accustomed to a much different dynamic. Relative geography plays a large part in it. For example, if I want to hit up my friend’s pad on the upper east or upper west side (or even Hell’s Kitchen)…it’s an event (considering I hate public transportation and rather spend my cash on alcohol rather than on random rides with imperfect strangers that listen to tribal music and speak unknown languages into their cell phones nonstop). I’m sometimes even inclined to pack an overnight bag to prevent the late-evening cash-blowing cab ride home (since a late-evening subway ride is asking for a scary freakfest and/or a random hookup followed by the need for a hepatitis vaccination).

But one absolute truth remains when it comes to human relationships. Priorities always make themselves known and resurface at the correct frequency. The great thing, and sometimes frustrating, thing about New York relationships (platonic or other) is that it’s not considered shady if you don’t talk to an “other” for weeks at a time. It’s only considered a side-effect of an unstable environment created by an island full of fickle people that are consistently trying to be as real to themselves as humanly possible. And we’re not being shallow, we’re just being honest!

And then there is that segment of the population that is totally incapable of committing to anything other a series of less-than-meaningful interactions. I’m afraid I might be a member of that segment! In all honesty, we do spend minimal time initiating relationships and at least twice the time getting out of most of them (or dealing with the remnants left from them in our lives).

This brings up another relational subject. Some people, places & things are only meant to come into our lives for a season. We are lucky to have some of these entities for any time at all. So why is it that when we lose some of these things, we act surprised and become jaded to some extent?

I digress :-)