In a few days, I will be observing the 30th anniversary of my 29th birthday. As I look back on my life, my mind can distill the most important thing I have ever learned. It is simply this: There is nothing "more than" friends.
Of all the loves human beings experience, most have strings attached, some are grindingly arbitrary, but only one is freely chosen, free of extraneous expectations, &, often, built to last a lifetime.
My friend @VANP recently wrote a blog about family being "what you make it". I love my family. They are all gone now. I am the last one still living, either a Dodo bird, or a saber-tooth tiger, on the verge of extinction. In the culture of my ethnic group (Polish) - "Family" is everything. I don't know what happened to me, but I never felt that way. It always seemed like an arbitrary grouping, based on blood-ties. My sister was 6, when I was born. I think, it was the worst time for her to quit being the only child. I don't think she ever got over it. We never were friends. In later years, with me living in the Southwest, & her living in "New Yorker heaven" - Florida - we had a very cordial relationship, calling each other a couple of times a year - realizing we would never have to deal with each other again. She died 3 years ago, on my birthday.
Being "more than" friends, of course, is falling in love, having sex, moving in, & all that good stuff! While I'm not really sure it's "more than", I am convinced it is "other than" friendship. No matter how noble you are, you cannot fall in love without bringing a shit-ton of your own needs, expectations, desires, & insecurities along for the ride. Romantic love has an inherently selfish component in it. If it works, having those needs filled is what allows you to face the rest of your life with greater strength & equanimity.
32 of my 59 years have been spent in the company of my beloved wife. It seems to me that so much is loaded onto marriage: sex partner, business partner, co-parent, personal advisor, life companion, power of attorney, care-taker - it is cruel to expect one person to fulfill all these roles perfectly. To anybody who married the love of your life, who is also your best friend, I salute you, because that particular constellation is not easy to maintain! Many more people do not marry the love of their life. Perhaps, they get lonely waiting for the love of their life, or they need security, or their biological is ticking. And to have been thrown in with one person to face career changes, financial stress, child rearing, major life crises, and the myriad quotidian frustrations of every day life - & come out besties is a Herculean achievement!
Friends are drawn together by common history or common interests. They are people who, generally, have no explicit ties to you. They never say "We need to talk about our relationship." In fact, they, generally, talk easily about everything BUT your relationship. They can go away for decades, and yet, take up the friendship as if they never left. They seldom talk about how much they love you. But, when the chips are down: when somebody dies, or the romance is shattered, or you've lost your job, or your kid ran away - Theirs are the first feet in your doorway & the first shoulder proferred, for you to cry on. So, take it from an old man, NOTHING on Earth means more than friendship!
