Friends

A man's spirit can be dampened by many things, and these are generic, they affect everyone. Doing badly for a test, being ditched by your girlfriend, being scolded by someone you love or respect, all these generally cause people to feel sad and depressed.

But only a few things can truly eat at a man's spirit, making him drained and weary of life. It will not destroy a man's life, and in spite of how much we complain about our problems we at school, we really experience few things that have the potential to wreck us forever at our relatively young age. But nevertheless, problems and issues that have the potential to drain us emotionally are always present. And these are not generic, they vary greatly from person to person.

When I appear stressed and depressed, many people assume that it is due to the workload. I can safely say that that is at best a secondary cause of my weariness. Work can never be finished, and it will always remain part of our lives. There is nothing to be depressed about, nothing to lament.

What really gets at me is the entire question of friendships. I have always believed that friendships have only one requirement for them to be true friendships, i.e. trust. I must not only be able to trust what you say to me is genuine and sincere, but I must also be able to trust that you will remain a true friend, a friend who will always be there for me, support me, be frank with me, and basically be someone who looks out for me, who protects my interests almost as though they were his own. I have always believed in this. Indeed, I may not be the perfect friend, neither the most diplomatic in words nor the most sensitive at times, but I always strove to be a true friend, to do the hard things and not the easy cosmetic ones. I have always strove to tell the truth all the time even when it is hard, and i have always strove to support and protect my friends without hesitation. I have tried to fulfil my own criteria of what is a good friend.

I stress that it is my own criteria, because the perception of friends in society, or at least the community in which I go about my life, is somewhat different. In fact, I suspect that a more precise term for friends, would be transient aquaintences of convenience. Friends are now mere tools for manipulation, be it through false promises or otherwise. Friends are people you want to associate with to be popular, to have some semblence of a sense of belonging. Friends are now people who your ally yourself with against a common enemy. Friends are someone you just hang out with, without any emotion below the skin level. Everything is indeed a facade, a means to a selfish end, everything is transient, rational and materialistic.

Perhaps, what depresses me and makes me weary is this. The sight of perverse friendships, mock sincerity and sly manipulation. It used to irk me, but now I am used to it, it just happens so often. And one cannot help but to be suspicious, to play this poisonous ball game. I am lost and I do not know what now is the yardstick for a friend. Who is my friend? What is a friend?

Disillusionment. "That's what friends are for" may soon be Musical toilet paper.