Archive for the 'Friendship' Category

• 7.7.07 "What happened to personal letters?" is posted in Friendship, Reflections, Relationships

I was deciding between my blog and my (paper) journal tonight–where to capture the emotion I’m feeling right now? And then it occurred to me that I hadn’t written one of those long, serious, personal letters I used to write all the time. And that just seemed like the right way to let it out.

I’m fairly outspoken and have friends who listen–so normally I’d just grab the phone and reach out. For how many years has this been possible? I mean, it was always possible, but there was a time when people were generally away from a personal line most of the day, when long distance was expensive, when people had to share phones. That was a time when I would write to my friends to seek out advice, to share a thought, to let out an emotion. No matter whether it was email or paper, it was a very different process.

It’s not that we can’t write seriously anymore; arguably, it’s easier than ever. (more…)

• 4.28.07 "The Person and the Experience" is posted in Friendship, Reflections

Last night I hosted another dinner party (pics), and I think a good time was had by all. But it has me thinking about the reason why I host parties sometimes versus why I spend time with friends 1-on-1…and the difference between enjoying a person versus enjoying an experience.

Jared part 1: I prefer to get together with people 1-on-1, and most of my plans are coordinated as such.
Jared part 2: I love making my friends happy (i.e., entertaining, sending a random present or a card, etc).

Now don’t get me wrong, part 1 & part 2 don’t have to conflict because I don’t mind being around a bunch of people, especially when they’re all my friends. But I think part 1 stems from enjoying the person–who my friend is, what they believe in, the history of our friendship, etc. And part 2 as relates to entertaining a group is twofold. On the one hand, I get the benefit of seeing a lot of people enjoying themselves. On the other, most of the good time is because of the group experience and less about the individual people. There’s nothing wrong with an experience, but while the sum of the whole may be greater than its parts, it becomes a very different being in the process. (more…)

• 3.10.07 "Presence, and the barometer of friendship" is posted in Friendship, Reflections

I had a strange reminder today of how my idea of friendship might be different than my friends. It was kind of an unfortunate conversation, where she actually said “how can you be considered a close friend, we’ve only seen each other twice.” It was clear that we had different definitions of what constituted friendship. And let the record be clear, this wasn’t one of those blurry interested-in-something-more-because-in-When-Harry-Met-Sally-guys-can’t-be-friends-with-girls, this was a question of friendship alone.

In this particular case, I valued the friendship more on the fact that we’d been talking on the phone for probably about a year and a quarter, every month or so, and usually for over an hour. We emailed a fair amount, as well. We didn’t see each other much because we lived far away. I thought of her not necessarily as a close friend, but at least as a friend whose company meant a lot to me.

You’re probably curious why a conversation like this would come up. (more…)