But You Gotta Have Friends

Every once in a while, you get a lesson in friendship.

My oldest son, “Boy,” thinks that a “friend” is someone who posts stuff (usually about themselves) on his Facebook page. His idea of a conversation is a “comment” or, if he’s really pressed for time, a thumbs up “Like” for a picture or video he’s added. Most of the time, he and his “friends” are talking past each other, not having a conversation or connecting in any way.

I watch him navigate all of his social media choices, and I purse my lips. Friendship, I think to myself, is about to go the way of the dodo.

But then I think back on the last several months of my own life, and my dealings with people I would, if asked, have referred to as “friends.” Mainly, they’re colleagues and acquaintances, who fit neatly into the little pockets of my life, as I fit into theirs, and whom I like. We throw hour-long baby showers for them, email little jokes to their in-boxes, and ask earnestly how their kids are doing after a bout with the flu. But, are we “friends”?

One colleague is working on a huge case with me. Over the years, I’ve listened to her family problems, and she visited me when I was in the hospital. I would have called her a friend without hesitation up until about a month ago, when I came face to face with the fact that I really hadn’t thought about it hard enough. That was the day this colleague, I’ll call her “Mary,” threw me under the proverbial bus in open court. Her particular betrayal had to do with undermining my position and ability to do my job, and what’s worse, she did it without even knowing that she was crossing a line. As in, it never occurred to her that what she was saying was in any way hurtful or offensive. It wasn’t the first, or even the thirty-first, time she’d cut the legs out from under me; it was just the worst so far. I’d swallowed my pride and my retorts, because the case came first, and it would do no good at all to derail the train for the sake of my ego. I had my share of sympathetic looks from other members of the team, and told people – and myself – that the best approach was just not to let it bother me.

So this one day, I let it bother me. I began to explain to her that what she’d done was a new low, and her utterly blank face and its What did I do? thought bubble just pushed me over the edge. As she tried to school me on why I wasn’t qualified to do the task we had been discussing in court, I snapped, “I am too angry to talk to you right now.” And I walked away. It was a full week before I spoke to her again. It took almost a month for her to come to me and apologize.

Here’s where the lesson on friendship came in. I was raised to believe that forgiving and forgetting went hand in hand. That an apology set the counter back to zero, and you moved forward as if nothing had happened. And perhaps that’s why the concept of self-esteem has always had a slightly foreign flavor to it for me. So when faced with what I can only describe as a half-assed apology (full of excuses and reasons for the tiny subset of egregious behavior that she was willing to recognize only after a third party pointed it out to her with circles and arrows) accompanied by a plea not to lose our “friendship” and what may have been remorseful tears, I sat in silence for a moment. I waited for the Christian part, the turn-the-other-cheek, forgive-seventy-times-seven-for-they-know-not-what-they-do part to kick in. I even said a prayer for the right words.

God answers prayer, and here’s what I said. I accept your apology. I know you want me to say that we can go back to being friends, but I really can’t. I don’t know if we ever will, because you have hurt me very deeply. I will continue to be civil, because we are grownups, but I have resigned myself to the fact that I don’t have to be friends with someone to try a case with her. I didn’t raise my voice or anything; I didn’t need to – and I felt peace.

Another me would have backtracked, instinctively coupling forgiveness with assent: it’s okay, which translates to, it’s okay to treat people, specifically me, with disrespect and condescension. I’m used to it, and I’ll take it some more.

But that’s not forgiveness. That’s enabling. That’s not humility; that’s self-abuse. And it’s not friendship.

Years ago my mother said something very profound. When I was upset over a disappointing relationship, she observed, point-blank, “There are more than 6 billion people on this planet. Not every one of them is going to be your friend.”

Not every colleague is going to be my friend. Not every person who writes slogans on my Facebook wall, or sends me email jokes is my friend.

And you know what? That’s okay. I don’t know when I lost that concept. If I ask Scooby, “What is a friend?”, you know what she’ll say? “A friend is someone who helps you and who you help when they need it.”

It really is that simple. Help them get through the day. Help them see the truth of themselves. Help them move forward when they can’t. Help them in ways, small and large, to succeed. And count on them to do the same for you.

Everybody else is just baggage. A Facebook friend, in name only.

I hope Boy realizes this a lot sooner than I did.

So, to take a cue from him: Sorry, “Mary,” I’m un-friending you. Bye.

That felt good.