friends are friends forever...

don't worry i'll refrain from quoting the famous michael w. smith though i'm sure you are all now singing it in head. it's okay, me too!

friendship is the best thing.

i'm re-reading same kind of different as me. actually i'm currently taking a break from writing a paper on it so that i can blog about it. if you haven't read it. please do so asap! it's so great, true, and challenging.

here's why friendship is the best thing according to my friend, denver:

"i'm gon' tell you right now what i first thought about mr. ron askin me would i be his friend: i didn't like it. why would he want to be my friend? that's what i was thinkin. what does he want? everybody want somethin. why don't he pick somebody else? why i got to be his friend?

you got to understand that by that time, i had layers of street on me a mile thick. some homeless folks got lotsa friends, but i hadn't ever let nobody get that close. it wadn't that i was worried about gettin hurt or nothin like that. bein a friend is a heavy commitment. in a way, even more than a husband or wife. and i was selfish. i could take care a myself, and ididn't need nobody else's baggage. besides that, friendship to me means more than just somebody to talk to, or run with, or hang with.

bein friends is like being soliders in the army. you live together; you fight together; you die together. i knowed mr.ron wadn't fixin to come up outta no bushes and help me fight.

but then i got to thinkin about him some more and though maybe we might have somethin to offer each other. i could be his friend in a different way that he could be my friend. i knowed he wanted to help the homeless, and i could take him places he couldn't go by hisself. i didn't know what i might find in his circle or even that i had any business bein there, but i knowed he could help me find out whatever was down that road.

the way i looked at it, a fair exchange ain't no robbery, and a even swap ain't no swindle. he was gon' protect me in the country club, and i was gon' protect him in the hood. even swap, straight down the line..."if you is lookin for a real friend, then i'll be one. forever." (p. 108-109 denver moore)

go read the book.

go be a friend.

forever.