In between

I found two great friends this summer. One corrupts me. Another one tries to save my soul.

One tempts me with new experiences, unconditional freedom and the joy of surpassing conventional wisdom. Another one refuses to repeat any irrational ways of mine but does not judge me either.

I sense animosity between them. Each one thinks of the other as an extreme, and I am caught in the crossfire.

I need both of them very much. I grew so close to them, I care for both, each one gives me comfort that only a good long-time friend can give, and I feel I can keep my balance as long as I have them both in my life. But I also feel that the darker side is so much easier to fall to. I would like to go there, it seems, stay for just a little, and then come back. When I look that direction, however, I don’t see a turning point. I try to stay on the safe side, but I easily get bored.

I believe people don’t have to adjust their characters in order to be good friends. Minor improvements are good; becoming something you are not isn’t. I feel like I need to stay where I am, in the middle, and I hope it won’t cause losing any of them. I need some moral incentives though, and I need them bad.

Friends who are

It’s how we treat people around us that they will treat us back. It’s how much we really care about their responses to our questions that they will open up to us. It’s how close to our hearts we let them that they will let us to theirs.

I am so happy to lend you an ear, my friend, even if you won’t shut up for hours :) I learned more about you last night than I know about myself, it seems. You are worth every minute of it though, because it’s you I run to when I need to get heard.

Friends who were

I think sometimes we are too scared to renew old bonds. For one reason or another we lose connection with people whose company we actually used to enjoy some time back then. We lose a common place or institution — a school, a job, a neighborhood or a city… We lose common friends or a hobby. Sometimes we lose people without even getting a chance to know them better, thinking regretfully that we might have actually become friends, if we had just taken a little more time to find a common thread… before we lost each other.

We are so used to losing we don’t give much meaning to it anymore. There is no time in our lives for writing letters or attending reunions. We are too busy seeking for the new in this world to remember and appreciate the old.

The soccer game this weekend is my major attempt to reconnect with those old friends whose company I used to enjoy, but whom I lost to moving, time, work and other excuses — just go through the list of what you say when you don’t keep in touch for too long and you will know exactly what I am talking about.

It wasn’t easy to invite them, it’s never easy to make that first step to reconnect, but now that I did, I am eager to see what comes out of this.

One art

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

— Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

~ Elizabeth Bishop

Blame it on summer

Summer to me means a lot of linen, which I love to wear but hate ironing. It also means swimming pools, the smell of sunscreen, colorful flip flops and chatting with girls in one of the sidewalk cafés, enjoying the warm wind’s kisses on our cheeks.

Summer brings an excuse to take random candid photos “just because it’s nice outside” and to stay up late “just to listen to birds chirp at dawn.”

Leaning back leisurely and watching people pass by the coffee house window counts as a viable activity in summer. Sitting inside – be it an office or a home – while the sun is burning holes in the pavement counts as a crime on my heart’s watch.

I blame it on the season when social ties seem to become of utter importance, overshadowing other, more serious (who said?) things in life. I think it is completely the summer’s fault when my heart and mind suddenly decide to walk in opposite directions, pulling me apart persistently, with the heart scoring points toward victory two thirds of the time.

One of these warm summer nights brought a fight between me and you, one of my best friends. I don’t really want to know at this point whether it was our foolish youth running through out veins, a couple of beers or a mere misunderstanding fueled by a thing or two left unsaid. Let’s just blame it on this hot season and the overdose of emotions it throws at us, breaking the weak defense that is out reason.

When I saw you through one of those coffee house windows parking your bike at the curb, I thought it was meant for us to make up today. Why else would summer want us to run into each other like that in a city with abundance of places to go lick our wounds?

I put my pride somewhere deep in the back pocket and I came to you, my hands shaking, trying not to let go of some fair trade sugar I just grabbed. I apologized although I didn’t feel like I deserved your negative attitude. Would you come to my table, I asked, if I didn’t approach you first? No, you said proudly. I felt that you were unfair to me and our friendship and I thought that you, the older one of us two, should have acted more mature. I was angry inside yet I could not afford to lose you. The thought of this summer without you crept into the back of my mind as you were standing in front of me, paying for your coffee. I was scared to death that you’d turn around and walk past me, throwing our friendship away coldheartedly. I pictured bumping into each other awkwardly in little downtown restaurants and trying to share friends most of which we had in common. I saw the boring pool parties without you, that bottle of Sangria I bought to share with you left unopened, tedious shopping trips with other less fashionable friends and not having you on the phone late at night to laugh about our latest girly adventures. I was afraid of not being able to see you across the table from me – like tonight – leaning toward each other to share happenings at work, our sappy memories, grown-up dreams and random things like those few lines from your book on the history of rock.

It would be my last attempt to approach you, I knew, and you must have felt it. Which one is my table, you asked, following me. You accepted my explanation, and deep in my heart I felt that you were sorry too, although you wouldn’t say it. As we walked out onto the sleepy summer street after chatting for hours, you said you wanted to see me tomorrow. You pulled me closer, hugged me and kissed me, and in my mind I answered, “Don’t worry about saying a thing, my friend, because I already know.” I smiled, turned around and felt a touch of that playful warm wind on my face. It felt like summer.