This month I attended a memorial for two beloved people and it's left me tender in spots. What I'm noticing a lot while I read isn't necessarily about art but about friendship. I could argue for a relationship between the two, but if you can't do that for yourself, you don't have the right friends. Here's what I heard lately.
From an episode of the lamented Sports Night, mostly written by Aaron Sorkin:
I came here to tell you that, no matter what you decide, you've got friends. This is what friends gear up for.
And from an episode of the great West Wing, also mostly written by Aaron Sorkin:
This guy's walkin' down a street when he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out. A doctor passes by and the guy shouts up, "Hey, you, can you help me out?" The doctor writes a prescription, throws it down in the hole, and moves on. Then a priest comes along and the guy shouts up, "Father, I'm down in this hole. Can you help me out?" The priest writes out a prayer, throws it down in the hole, and moves on. Then a friend walks by. "Hey, Joe, it's me. Can you help me out?" And the friend jumps in the hole. Our guy says, "Are you stupid? Now we're both down here!" The friend says, "Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know the way out."
I'm also hearing about that particular sort of friend, the ally. Here's an anecdote from the remarkable writer, Nalo Hopkinson, about the legendary writer, Samuel "Chip" Delaney:
Years later, I was at a con with Chip when a young man asked him a question. That young man, gay and black, as Chip is, had just attended a writing workshop where he'd found it very difficult to get recognition about why the things he was writing about were important. He asked Chip how a black gay man could find his voice in science fiction. Almost before the words were out of his mouth, a white woman overrode him with, "well, I just don't see race in my life. I don't make it a problem. I don't see race. It just doesn't exist as an issue."
Very gently, Chip replied, "If you can't see something that threatens my life daily, then you can't help me fight it. You can't be my ally."
And I was charmed and moved by the anonymous one-sentence commencement addresses proposed in the comments column of the
PostSecret blog recently, such as:
loving the imperfect makes us love our own imperfections
There is no such thing as a soulmate.
I have mixed feelings about this one, I confess, but it too is making me think about the role of friendship in my life:
As you get older, you need more people who knew you when you were younger.
You should view the world as a conspiracy run by a very closely-knit group of nearly-omnipotent people, and you should think of those people as yourself and your friends.
And as I was preparing this entry, I was chatting with a friend in another tab. I'd confessed I was blue and asked him to tell me stories. Here's one of the things
Parthipan Siva told me tonight:
big sign in your office, home where ever "Am I enjoying what I am doing?"
if you answer no you probably are on top of everest jumping for the moon thinking everyone is on the moon when in reality they haven't even made it up everest yet
not to say you can't reach the moon but it would be easier after resting at the top of everest
That's why we invest in friends, for advice about Everest. (Thanks, Parthi.)