I value the friend who for me finds time on his calendar, but I cherish the friend who for me does not consult his calendar.

—Robert Brault

I called Pat yesterday. In the past, I’ve always let him call me, since he’s invariably more busy than I am. Even if we try to make plans to hang out, we usually leave off with him getting back to me as soon as he finds out when he’s available next, due to the fact that he likes to be booked a month in advance. This time, I wanted to be the one initiating, because I realized that out of all my friends, I see him the least. Even if we hang out once a month, which may be considered quite sufficient, that’s only 12 times in a year.

The thing that makes it awkward is the fact that I don’t know the make-up of his social calendar. I don’t know how much of his life is devoted to Jen or allocated for other friends. Usually I only see him between events, and he’s always rushing off to do something else. The last thing I want to do is be a selfish person and smother him, especially a person whose time is as valuable as his. This is actually one of the things I worry about, when I know that I shouldn’t (John has recently helped me realize that I overanalyze things). I trust that Pat will let me know when I start taking up too much of his time.

In either case, as usual, he’s going to call me back to have dinner at the Black Tomato. I had to recommend that we go, because I always enjoy myself when I patronize that restaurant. I also chose to have a meal instead of doing something else, because food is one of Pat’s hobbies. He treated me the last time we had dim sum, when it was actually my turn, so I’m hoping he won’t put up a fight when I go to pay for the bill. In addition to the great fusion food, I’ll have the chance to order a glass of Wynns Coonawarra Estate cabernet sauvignon which I haven’t had the pleasure of tasting for a few months.

A chance to catch up, a chance to get to know Jen better, a chance to try out some new food. It’s going to be good.

Beth. Mysterions. Scratches, beats, drum rolls.

It’s funny. Sometimes I read confessions on group hug and someone will be going on about how they have this problem, but they can’t tell anyone because no one would understand. Almost every time, no matter what it is, my first reaction is to roll my eyes and think to myself, “Trust me, you probably know someone who understands”.

And then I realize that this isn’t true, because it isn’t true for me. There are quite a few things that I feel like I can’t tell my friends. Not because I’d be afraid of losing them over it, but because none of them have had the same experiences as me, thus rendering unable to help.

John is usually the first person I’ll tell my problems to because I’m most comfortable with him. I’ve known him for more than half my life, and he’s as fallible as me. I also have a lot more shit on him than he does on me (how do I keep John loyal…blackmail, hah). But generally I don’t want to tell him about my problems because he doesn’t think like me at all.

Pat is the person I’d most want to tell things to, simply because he has too much good in his heart and knows me well enough that I couldn’t possibly say or do anything to make him angry. Yet he’s the last person I end up going to for help or advice, just because he’s so busy. Sometimes I’ll tell Aaron and Trolley, but I don’t linger on things too long for fear of boring them.

I mean, what’s the point of telling someone who doesn’t think the same way or hasn’t been in the same situation? It’s not like they don’t care, they just actually don’t understand, so what could they possibly do to help (aside from direct involvement if the option is there, but if the option is there it wouldn’t be a problem). Sometimes, the most that a friend can do is lend an ear.

Sometimes it’s enough. Otherwise, there’s this.

My own, personal group hug.

I don’t know why I didn’t figure this out before, but I guess the good thing is that I know better now. Maybe it was all too simple to see.

Friendship is all or nothing. Friends are the all, the ones I’d give my life for, the ones that I unconditionally accept. Non-friends are the nothing, the ones I couldn’t care less about. The ones that don’t fit in either category, due to insufficient information to make such a decision, are acquaintances (and some remain acquaintances forever).

Unconditional acceptance is the toughest part of friendship, because it’s the biggest commitment. It’s the biggest reason that I consider such few people to be my friends. It’s so easy to walk away when people change, when people grow apart. It’s not so easy to accept and understand, especially for someone as selfish and with as little tolerance as me. A friend is a friend for life.

I love you, Aaron.

I love you, Darren.

I love you, John.

I love you, Pat.

I just played the best three hours of table tennis in my life. Pat and I headed to the games room on campus, and had three matches to the best of 19, a total of 43 games. Every single muscle in my body is completely exhausted. The worst are the soles of my feet, which are more sore than when I stood for five hours at the Strung Out concert.

We’d been planning to play for more than three months now, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it for a while. All week, I had been trying to develop some strategy to beat him, but couldn’t come up with a single idea since he plays with a strong backhand with a pen-grip. I decided to simply play more aggressively than him, and figure out his weakness on the fly. In the end, I just ran him around a lot, putting the ball on alternating corners or at an angle he didn’t expect. I can serve consistently now, and have gotten much better at controlling how long or short they are.

Almost none of his previous strategies worked on me. His quick serves to my right don’t do much anymore because I’ve been successful in balancing out my position at the table. His downspins don’t work anymore because the people at the club really make me work on my chops and my pushes. His rally hits to my left don’t work anymore because I’ve been improving my backhand for the last two weeks. My short game has become as good as his. The only thing he could do was serve a downspin to my left to force a weak return, which is something he figured out rather quickly.

I ended up winning all the matches, 10–5, 10–3, 10–5, but both of us agreed that they were the finest we’ve ever played. It was three hours of pure intensity, not only physically but mentally as well. Concentrating on the serve, the strategy, trying to figure out a weakness, adapting to an opponents, keeping track of the ball, I was ready to collapse when I got home.

I haven’t seen Pat in more than two months. We’re trying to schedule something for March, and by that time it’ll be an entire quarter year since we’ve hung out. I’ve come a long way since I last saw him, in terms of mindset, and he’s probably the only one who totally understands how gravely important that is to me. It’s too bad that my other close friends don’t completely understand me, although it’s no fault of their own and I don’t hold it against them.

It takes pain to understand pain, and Pat is the one who’s had the most similar experiences. If there was one person in this world who has me figured out, it’s him. It used to feel as though he would have to come to my level to talk to me, to understand what I was going through, to give me guidance and support.

Now it feels as if I’ve come to his level, and I understand his attitude, motivations, and worldview much better as a result of this. He admitted that he always wondered when I’d get there, and he’s curious if he’ll notice a change the next time he sees me.

I see all the influences that change me as adding more to my mind, another piece to the quilt.

Keeping every piece becomes as important as gaining more.