An intention for friendship

Dear friend,

While it is difficult to convey in words the truth of almost anything worth conveying, I thought I would jot down a few words which I hope might reach your ears and ring the same bells of truth that are reaching my ears here in Vermont.

Now the pretty poetry of carefree affectations can at times be a conduit for the truth, and at other times an impediment, so I will try to be direct.

I do not intend to give up on our friendship.

We have recently had conversations that were, for me, at times, difficult. Sometimes, what follows difficult conversations is disconnection. It could be, I suppose, that the day comes when we decide for whatever reason to give up on friendship. But for my part, today is not that day. Today I have faith in our lovely connection and our long-enduring friendship.

I am saying this because I like you. I like talking to you. I appreciate your insights, and your clarity, and the beauty that you express in your words. I hope to be friends for a long time.

I appreciate our friendship so much, in fact, that it is tempting to try in one way or another to grab hold of it and cling to it for dear life. That is part of the reason for the question I posed in our last conversation, and for giving into the temptation to grab hold like that, I apologize.

I don’t think we can go back. Just a few weeks ago there was a possible future in which such a question was never asked. That future has now been cut off. Less is possible now, and thank goodness for that, because as the infinite cloud of hypothetical futures is reduced to the single strand of one real life, things become real, and that is the terrifying, exhilarating, and completely inescapable thing about being alive. I am so incredibly happy to share just a few of these remarkable turns with you, dear friend, and I want you to know that this is how I see things because you are dear to me, and I value our friendship, and I do not want you to be alone in anything that you do.

So what can I really say? I intend to keep reaching out to you. I trust you to make your own decision about what to do on your side. That’s it. The rest of this short piece is just rhetorical flourish.

And so, in the good spirit of healthy rhetorical flourish, let me say this: Let us celebrate! We have passed through the eye of the storm, now. The loneliness of pent-up desire is behind us; let us never go back! A better future awaits. The wind and the rain and the trees have been inviting us to join them in the sunshine for some time, only now we are beginning to understand what their whispers mean. It is an invitation to celebrate the fading away of mere possibilities and the thunderous arrival of real life. Here it is. Again, and again, and again.

Be well my friend.