Saturday 22 December 2007

Apparently I needed a half-hour to think about my chosen topic for the day before I wrote about it. I say this because I decided on my topic while I was writing the last post, and then left it 'unfinished' and went away and procrastinated for the next half-hour. I checked webcomics when I knew there weren't updates, looked at all my Firefox tabs, closed the unnecessary ones, did a puzzle. Now I've thought, I can write.

So I mentioned that I spent a few days with my best friend in March. She's my dearest friend in the world. But when people say that, they usually also mention 'closest' and say they can just call and talk about anything. So I have to face the fact that I'm not very good at 'close'.

Of course, Smith is my closest friend. He and I can talk about anything, any time we want to, and we do. But hey, there are only so many hours in the day, and he likes to do other things too, and so do I. (Right now he's playing Super Mario Galaxy, which is such a fun game, I like to join in too at times.) Anything that has to be said 'now' or 'before I forget' or 'about us' can be said. But most of my thoughts aren't that urgent or pertinent. We share a lot of those too, just not all.

Okay, so back to my best friend. Every so often, she'll call me, and we'll spend 45 minutes or maybe 2 hours talking about interesting stuff. We'll tell each other how our lives are going. Sometimes we'll go out and just walk for five hours, looking at things (museums, art galleries, the harbourside walks, suburbia) and talk about whatever comes up.

But we don't talk about everything. Much as I feel I'm an open person and I love to share, well, I love to listen and discuss things a lot more than I like to talk. (Although I do love to write.) And there are places we don't feel the need to go. We don't have to talk about "men", for example, because she's single and not looking (as far as I know), and I'm married and not looking. We don't feel the need to share our whole inner lives or private lives.

But there are also things I'd like to talk about, that I'm uncomfortable broaching. And one of them is our friendship. Does anyone else find that a difficult thing to talk about?

You obsess over your relationship with your SO (or husband/wife as the case may be). If you have to live with them, so you might as well get it right, and one good way (the best in my opinion) is to think and talk about it. With your family, you might mention things casually, or if you're close you might go as far as arguments and compliments and the occasional 'I love you Mum'. And with a not-so-good friend, if they do something that bothers you, you might tell them and ask them to stop, although it's mostly not that important and you leave it.

But with my best friend ... I dunno. 'Hey, let's talk about us' seems to imply that there's something wrong. She's never actively done anything that bothers me. But I would still find it difficult to start a conversation that was, well, to do with her (good or bad).

And last time I was with her in March, I tried it. We said ... basically nothing. The conversation lasted one sentence, and then we were both too uncomfortable or hesitant to continue.

And no, I didn't actually say anything bad about her, I didn't say anything about her at all. I simply said enough to let her know that I was thinking about a particular private issue that had to do with her, and mused upon a question. She answered some of it truthfully, and then said no more. And I was left wondering if, just by going there, I had hurt her.

What bothers me the most is that I simply don't know if I offended her. I thought about it on the 5-hour train ride home, and while I normally love train rides, that one was hell. I could also list other examples from that trip where I did something and I don't know whether it bothered her. I'm not a very good houseguest. But I don't know how to broach that one with her either.

I've been out with her since then. We had a good time, like we always do. She's even done something since then that tells me she's been thinking about the issue I brought up. And she told me about what she'd done. If there ever was an opening to talk about that issue with her, that would have been it. But it wasn't an opening, really, and I don't know if I'll ever talk with her about it.

Maybe I'll call her now.

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the angel Jean