It’s been 10 years since my first blog post. And I’ve probably written 10 posts. At 5:30 AM, after being awake since about 3:30, I’m feeling the need for #11ish.

[EDIT: This is actually post #23! I underestimated myself.]

In 2019, what does “friend” mean?

Merriam Webster
friend noun
\ ˈfrend \
Definition of friend (Entry 1 of 2)
1a : one attached to another by affection or esteem
She’s my best friend.
b : ACQUAINTANCE
2a : one that is not hostile
Is he a friend or an enemy?
b : one that is of the same nation, party, or group showbiz friends
3 : one that favors or promotes something (such as a charity) this trend has alarmed friends of the liberal arts — Raymond Walters
The friends of the library will host a fund-raiser.
4 : a favored companion
5 capitalized : a member of a Christian sect that stresses Inner Light, rejects sacraments and an ordained ministry, and opposes war — called also Quaker

friend verb
friended; friending; friends
Definition of friend (Entry 2 of 2)
transitive verb
1 : to act as the friend of : BEFRIEND
2 : to include (someone) in a list of designated friends on a person’s social networking site

Urban Dictionary
1 friend
A friend is someone you love and who loves you, someone you respect and who respects you, someone whom you trust and who trusts you. A friend is honest and makes you want to be honest, too. A friend is loyal.
A friend is someone who is happy to spend time with you doing absolutely nothing at all; someone who doesn’t mind driving you on stupid errands, who will get up at midnight just because you want to go on an adventure, and who doesn’t have to talk to communicate with you.
A friend is someone who not only doesn’t care if you’re ugly or boring, but doesn’t even think about it; someone who forgives you no matter what you do, and someone who tries to help you even when they don’t know how. A friend is someone who tells you if you’re being stupid, but who doesn’t make you feel stupid.
A friend is someone who would sacrifice their life and happiness for you.
A friend is someone who will come with you when you have to do boring things like watch bad recitals, go to stuffy parties, or wait in boring lobbies. You don’t even think about who’s talking or who’s listening in a conversation with a friend.
A friend is someone for whom you’re willing to change your opinions.
A friend is someone you look forward to seeing and who looks forward to seeing you: someone you like so much, it doesn’t matter if you share interests or traits. A friend is someone you like so much, you start to like the things they like.
A friend is a partner, not a leader or a follower.
The word “friend” comes from Old English “frēond”, which is actually the present participle of “frēogan”, which means “to love” and “to honor”.
#pal#buddy#kith#comrade#chum

2 friend
A friend is someone who won’t lie to you. They respect you for who you are and make every moment with you count. Time with your friends should be fun and you shouldn’t have to change for them. Your friends should understand you and trust you. They help you with your problems and are always there when you are feeling down.
A friend cannot be replaced so don’t even try.
#loyal#trustworthy#fun#understanding#honest

3 friends
people who are aware of how retarded you are and still manage to be seen in public with you. people who make you laugh till you pee your pants. people who cry for you when one of your special items disappear. when you dont have enough money to get a ice cream, they chip in. knows all of your internet passwords. who would never make you cry just to be mean.
I think I have a lot of friends that would fit this perfectly.
#reatarded#public#laugh#diappear#money#& cry

4 Friends
What i thought i had
nathan and will were my best friends but they stabbed me in the back
#butt lick#ass fuck#toobagan#sixety nine#doggy style

5 Friend
A word that defines those you keep company with. A person that is, trusting, caring, and will stick with you through thick and thin. The one you can talk to about anything and they won’t judge you for it. Someone that when times are hard stands beside you saying “let’s do this.” The person that if no one else will, will stick up for you.
Sam: How’s it going Nick?
Nick: Not to good my Friend.
Sam: Why? What’s up man?
Nick: My girl just left, cars broke, can’t pay my rent now. Shall I go on?
Sam: Nah, alright let’s go get a beer and have a chat man, it’s on me.
#friend#amigo#chum#accomplice#fool

6 friends
no such thing. fictional creatures from mars.
dude i have a lot of friends
#fun#fake#surreal#dumb#bald

7 Friend
Somebody who comes to your house and eats all of your food, (cheetos, doritos, pizza, etc,) and also uses your stuff with their cheeto dust hands.
“hey man, what happened to all of your snacks?” “aw man, my friend came over”
#friend#friends#friendly

Interesting that Merriam Webster mentions social media, but Urban Dictionary does not. It does, however, have a number of variations on the word. Some of the best:
frienationshift
friemisis
frienabomber
frienaddict
frienaissance
friencest

The question is/questions are “Are you really friends when…”
…one doesn’t communicate with you for a long time, relative to how often you usually (used to) communicate?
…your whole relationship is via text?
…you’re going through a prolonged hard time, but they stop checking in with you after a while?
…they don’t see you because their lifestyle/job/school/family situation has changed?
…they don’t talk to you about something that’s bothering them about your friendship?
…they’re in town for 6 months after being away for a year and they’re “too busy” to see you?

Friendships change, morph, and sometimes drift away, especially at certain times of life. But I’m starting to see a pattern in my friendship history. And I don’t like it.

It’s amazing how much time can be spent trying to figure out the root of personal evils when it’s often tagging along right behind you all the time. I recently spent a week with family, paying close attention to things I’ve uncovered that I want to change. Why I just stop talking when interrupted or challenged. Why I’ve always resisted standing up for my beliefs and opinions. I have a fairly new understanding of my strength, yet I’ve often used it only when the path was clear. An underlying feeling that no one will believe me or take my thoughts seriously. Why I’ve always stuck around, putting up with insensitive behavior.

With ponderings over the past few years, I seemed to have figured it out. But in the last week, I saw it unfold right in front of me. At least the part that still preys on me day to day. I learned that from the time I was small, I gave in to arguments because the only other option was to argue nonstop, as the other party insists they are always right. No matter the evidence to the contrary. And when the evidence presents itself, it’s hidden. I never had the opportunity to even learn that I was right.

As the youngest, my thoughts were giggled at, teased. How could her ideas be valid, she’s just the baby. Now I know they are. Even more than valid…insightful. I know when I’m right. And I recognize the evidence. Yet the struggle continues.

I also seem to be in direct line with my mother and grandmother. As the generations have passed, confidence has grown a bit stronger. I know that Gram wanted more. She worked at Princeton University Library as a single woman before she became a farmer’s wife and her life turned into plucking chickens and boiling water on the stove for the children’s baths. I don’t know the details of her longings, but she had the air of a stately and graceful woman. Not the type to haul and plant and gather eggs.

I believe Mom loved her life as a mother. She took pride in her home and had the support of Dad who would do all of the wallpapering and home decorating that she desired. We lived in nature where she watched her wildflowers grow and peeked at the groundhogs, deer, and periodic egret through the binoculars. But she also had a strong creative urge that was never satisfied. With the perfectionist strain that ran in the family, or perhaps was passed from parent to child through the generations, the creative endeavors she attempted were never good enough and she let them go. Although she always encouraged them in her children… every week-long beach vacation included paint-by-numbers, stained glass, or a homemade craft project like decorating Dad’s old tobacco tins with burlap contact paper and creatures made of small shells.

I’ve thought many times, maybe I can be the one to break some of these patterns. I know that chances are slim I’ll be able to change the innate characteristics of certain people, but maybe in changing myself I can show what’s possible. Especially to myself. Can I break out of the mindset that I need to follow rather than lead? Do things that fulfill me, rather than what I’m supposed to? Can I find a way to relate to people who will always be in my life so that I can still speak my mind without having to fight for the right?

Much of what holds me feels like a shell that needs to be busted…break it large, not a little at a time. I peck away at the smaller things, hoping eventually they will create a weakness in my shell that I can burst through.

President Obama recently quoted the Koran and mentioned Allah in reaching out to the Muslim community. One person in the audience commented that when he hears the word “Allah,” his heart opens.

Lera Boroditsky and colleagues at Stanford University studied grammatical gender systems by asking German-English and Spanish-English bilinguals to describe “bridge,” which is feminine in German and masculine in Spanish. The German-English bilinguals used words such as “elegant,” “slender,” “pretty,” all feminine-leaning adjectives. The Spanish-English bilinguals used words like “strong,” “towering,” “heavy,” “dangerous,” considered masculine in the English language. The gender of “bridge” in the native language seemed to have an impact on each bilingual’s view of the object.

In a recent Brain Science podcast episode, Alice Gaby said, “…when we write, the word that’s written to the left corresponds to what would have been spoken earlier than the word that’s written to its right. Now this is the way we do it in English but of course Hebrew or Arabic go from right to left, [in] Chinese, the writing system goes from top to bottom. Lera Boroditsky’s work actually looked at people’s non-linguistic cognition about time and particularly their gestures – how people move their hands when thinking and talking about time– and found a strong correlation between temporal sequence moving left to right for English speakers and right to left for, say, Hebrew speakers and top to bottom for Chinese Mandarin speakers.”

Each of these examples show the importance of communicating with people in their own language, if you wish to reach them. Many people repeatedly bang their heads against the wall trying to get a message across to people who are not like them. If some of that time was used to learn about and try to understand the people you are trying to reach, not only would your head feel better, but you might actually open a line of communication.

I have seen ‘professionals’ talk to seniors like they are children. Making assumptions that they don’t understand normal language. It’s belittling. And I know for a fact a senior will walk away rolling their eyes and give up trying to communicate. In senior facilities, this makes for a miserable life. Not all seniors are alike. Yes, some may have comprehension difficulties. Some may clearly understand what’s being said to them, but have trouble responding. It’s so important to get to know the senior you are speaking to and reach them at their own level, instead of expecting them to respond at the level you’re assuming. I guarantee, anyone who is continually talked down to will slowly regress.

Some parents yell at or order their children. Sometimes out of frustration, or lack of time. Maybe they’re just plain irritated. A child will only learn to ‘obey’ or act out even more. Scientists believe that language is acquired most easily during the first ten years of life. And how do they really learn their language? By how they are spoken to and the language they hear around them. Children want to learn. We can even think back and remember what it’s like to be a child who is confused because something was just stated without any explanation. Once a situation is explained to them, they are much less likely to rail against it. And hey…they’ll even learn! I know there are things I never truly learned in school because they were presented to me in the form of information to memorize. I was not given a context in which to place it, which would have worked it into my life and understanding.

There are as many ways of communicating as there are types of people. Open your mind and listen to whom you’re speaking. They don’t think like you do. Because everyone has a slightly different mind. It’s what makes the world so interesting.