Once in a while there are moments of truth in life where you can see, with crystalline clarity, two paths you can go down. not all the repercussions are readily visible but the bulk of them are laid out neatly and you have a choice. i have to say that over the last 20 years i have been thankful, happy, healed, blessed and a myriad of other pleased emotions over one decision made by a friend of mine when we was young, dumb and beyond fucked up.
i have seen our friendship tucked away like a memento and i have seen it pulled back out, still just as comfortable as it was on day one, though different. we have never felt a need to impress or dissemble, we have always found honesty just an easy as our silence. we have lost touch for 10+ years only to pick up conversation as if it'd been last week. we speak with an unabashed frankness about any and everything.
the moment that sealed this was one of pure and simple truth. he had no real reason to confess the truth, quite a bit to lose from it and plenty to gain from lies or even silence.
he chose the truth.
this set the tone for a life-long friendship that has healed and bolstered and surprised us both.
i still find it strange sometimes how soul-deep and immediate my fondness for him was - still ever steady and unchanged - as that is exactly what it is. fondness. a belonging that lets you know that you will always have a place in this life, they will always have their corner of yours and an unshakable notion that time, distance and circumstance will never really matter.
he was the first friend i ever had that never hid anything from me and i have never felt i needed to hide anything from him. i have spent a lifetime hiding everything from everyone, revealing only what i thought someone could handle, could stomach, could accept. he is unique in that, in all my interactions with him, i have never been ashamed of anything about me.
20 years ago he listened and advised and praised things i hated about myself. His uncomplicated friendship and absolute acceptance healed things in me that literally saved my life. about 8 years ago i listened as his world unraveled i assured him that it wouldn't last forever, i cheered and slipped away when the misery went into remission. now i am here, when then end of the life he built up is right there within reach, promising him that there is a new one right around the corner.
today he told me, with a little smidge of surprise, "You know... you are a good friend, [lapis]. i am really glad i know you. thank you for being my friend."
it has truly been my privilege, sir.
confessed on Tuesday, Mar. 20, 2012