Former lovers as friends.

Why can't I remain friends with my former lovers? Because! That's why!
Seriously. Of all the women with whom I've had sex, and was in love with, how many do I have an active friendship with? None. It's not that I don't want to. I think it's something that happened after the breakup.
For me, it has not been uncommon that the opportunity for post-breakup sex presents itself. If at that moment I have no prospects, I will seize the opportunity. Sometimes this opportunity presents itself more than once. Still, if I have no prospects, I will seize the opportunity more than once. I think this is where the possibility for a future friendship breaks down. If only I could keep it in my pants. But what do you say to a woman you've been in love with whose telling you to take it out of your pants? How does a guy say no to that? Even now, if I were not involved with anyone and someone I used to be in love with wanted to try and re-kindle the relationship, I would consider it (in most cases). Definitely NOT the woman I was married to or anyone I ever lived with though.
The only way I've been able to say no was if I was becoming involved with someone else. In that case there is an obstruction. A reason for me not to seize the opportunity. When that happened, they felt rejected. Another wrong turn in the post breakup interaction game.
How do people do it? I know lots of people who are really good friends with their former lovers and former spouses. I wish I understood this.
I guess I haven't cultivated this ability partly because my love relationships are very intense. Any current lover I might have probably wouldn't take kindly to me having a close association with someone who had been so intimate with me. One day, maybe I'll get it.

Imaginary friends.

This is an interesting phenomenon. Imaginary friends.
I'm trying to think if I have any. I don't think I do. If I ever did when I was a child, they are long since forgotten.
I've known people with imaginary friends though. Some of them pretty whacky too. I can't imagine what these imaginary friends are to them either. Are they a real, personified entity? Are they an hallucination? Or maybe just an idea of a person? Small children often have imaginary friends, but what are they really? Are they ghosts, angels or demons who haunt these young unprejudiced minds? Minds that have not yet been "taught" that these things don't exist in the real world. Could they be some inter-dimensional life form that only a child can see? One that we all forget when we grow into adolescence. Are they the product of a vivid imagination or some sort of early personality disorder that resolves itself with age?
Napoleon Hill had what he considered a virtual board of directors. He called it his cabinet. There were some famous names on it too. Abe Lincoln, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Thomas Edison among them. Interestingly, he actually knew Thomas Edison and had interviewed him at length for his book: "Think and Grow Rich." At one point he had to stop these imaginary board meetings he was having because he saw himself teetering on the edge delusion. He became concerned that his imaginary friends were gaining too much of a foot hold in reality.
There have been movies made about this too. Fight Club, for instance. SPOILER ALERT! This is a movie about a guy who had an imaginary friend and didn't even't know it...because he had developed a split personality. In the movie, the Narrator (who is never identified by name) has a friend he thinks he met on an airplane named Tyler Durden. Their escapades take them through all manner of dysfunctional relations and finally land them at a point of clarity. Kind of a twisted happy ending.
I sometimes wonder if more of us have imaginary friends that we don't know about. I know several women who speak of boyfriends they have, but I've known them for years and never met these boyfriends. Are they a figment designed to keep them out of relationships? Thus avoiding the risk of heartbreak. In two cases that come to mind, I have believed this to be true for quite some time. (If you're reading this, it's probably not you.) Maybe these boyfriends exist and I just haven't had occasion to meet them in years. Maybe. Maybe not.
In the end, if we do have imaginary friends, they must serve a purpose. Hopefully it's a purpose to preserve our sanity or facilitate our integration into the world around us. In most cases there's probably no harm to come from it.
Let us not forget though, every once in a while imaginary friends create the Son of Sam.

Nameless friends.

I'm pretty good about learning the names of my servers in restaurants, but what about everyone else I come into contact with?
I see several people at the market regularly. Nameless faces at the gas station, Starbucks, the drug store and the burger joints. The gal who sells me my bus pass every month. The butcher, the baker and the produce stocker. The gal at the McDonald's drive-up. The other gal at the In & Out. The fruity guy at Taco Bell who gets all flirty with me. That raven-haired chick at Corti Bros. Deli. The Barbara Streisand look-alike who dispenses my glasses and all those bar tenders! The people at the tasting rooms and the guy with orange gloves who waves at everyone. The guy with the hilarious comb-over hairdo at Pardee Camera. Seriously, it's worth going in just to see this monstrosity.
The guys at the bike shop and the guys at Home Depot. The guys at Blue Collar supply, the re-store and Red's plumbing (actually, his name might be Red). My neighbor down the street. A few of my neighbors down the street. My mailman. 20% of the guys who show up for my bike rides. The gal I saw in dance class the other night who knew my name. The guy who lets me in to Costco. The other guy who checks my receipt on the way out. The guy who delivers my paycheck to the office and they guy who hauls off the recycling bins.
All of these are examples of people I come into contact with and even have lengthy and friendly conversations with. Some of them for years. We talk about all kinds of things that would seem to be common ground, yet we never connect in a meaningful way. Each of us resigned to be a nameless acquaintance who will eventually fade once they get a better job or I start shopping somewhere else.
I guess we can't be friends with everyone, but we can be friendly!

Your best friend!

Wouldn't it be nice to have a friendship so strong that it would endure any turmoil that came into it?
A friend so loving that even if you yelled at them or called them a name in the heat of anger, they would still be there for you. They would stay by your side no matter what. Always with the same enthusiasm as the day you met. One whose only desire in life is your approval and your company. One who would fend off an attacker and give their life in an attempt to protect yours.
I'm talking about dogs. Man's (or woman's) best friend. They'll never lie to you; never cheat on you; and never do anything to deliberately hurt you as long as you treat them in a loving way and feed them.
How did we develop such an association with these animals? Scientists say that all dogs evolved from wolves. The theory is that we were hanging out around a campfire and a hungry wolf came up to check us out. Someone gave him a hunk of meat or a leftover bone and he decided to stay for a while. There was something special about that wolf. He wasn't afraid of us. When he got to know us, he found out we're really worth hanging around. We would give him food and affection, and just like any loving creature, he got a great sense of satisfaction from giving to us.
Over time we bread these animals to be more friendly. The process is really pretty simple and it's been recreated in modern times. All you do is find the litter at a couple weeks old and try to touch them. The ones that don't growl at you get pulled and bread with other more friendly dogs. They did this with Foxes about 50 years ago and they found that to go from completely wild to completely tame takes only ten generations. Interestingly, when this happens, they lose their perky ears too.
From there, it's mostly about looks. I have a friend with a dog that looks very much like a baby seal. Another with a dog that has 6" long cat fur. Small dogs, giant dogs, bald dogs and hairy dogs. They run the gambit of looks and traits. Dalmatians with their deafness. German shepards with their fearless loyalty. Samoyeds with their love of close contact. Dobermans with their aggressive territorial instincts. Dogs that are so ugly they bridged that gap back to cute. You know the one's I'm talking about. Basenjis, Beagles and other hounds with their keen noses, hunting instincts...and their annoying baying at the moon. Ugh! But you gotta' love 'em. Especially Beagles! Never has a finer looking animal roamed the face of the Earth as the Beagle!
Dogs. Our best friends! From the common wolf to all the different breeds we have today in just a few thousand years. To us, they are companions. To them, we are gods.
All I can say is, top this one.

Unrequited friendship.

Some people believe that eventually the people and things they really like will like them back. There are people I like who I wish would like me back. OK, OK, OK...so they're almost all women and I really wish they did more than just like me back. If you're reading this, you're probably not one of them. There are some men on the list too, getting back to celebrities from yesterday's posting. For these people, the door is open and all they need do is step through. In most cases I've resigned to the fact that if they haven't by now, they probably won't.
Let's talk about other forms of unrequited friendship. The things in our lives.
Tobacco!
Tobacco was my friend for many years. About 25 of them. I smoked a lot too. As near as I can tell I smoked about 350,000 cigarettes! When I started, they were 50¢ a pack. When I quit, they were hitting about $3.50 a pack. All along the way I had set benchmarks. When they hit $1.00, I'm quitting. Then it became $1.50, etc. In the end, I quit in an attempt to save a relationship I was in. It only prolonged the inevitable. She didn't care if I smoked or not anyway. As long as I could keep up dancing Hustle or Cha Cha, everything was just fine with her (when it came to my health).
But what did I get from all those years of smoking? Fucked up lungs. COPD. Not to mention the money I spent, and now continue to spend for a host of meds. I still remember that first drag of the morning...after the ten minute hacking, drive-heave session I would often wake up to. When I was married, the woman I was married to smoked too and the second hand smoke compounded the situation. Still, that first hit. That cigarette after a meal. They all seemed so satisfying, in spite of the smoke in the eyes and hacking. What was I thinking? Tobacco is no longer my friend.
Food
Food was and still is my friend. I love a big hunk of dead bloody cow meat! I love it so much that I eat one almost every day. And chocolate! MMMmmmmmm. Food has been such a friend to me that I've eaten too much of it for the last 20 years or so. The most I ever weighted (that I know of) was 285#. Last year I hit a low (recent) of 201# and I've been creeping back up through the winter. I need to drop a few pounds...again! One thing about food that many people will tell you is that if you get enough exercise, you can eat just about whatever you want. I buy in to that idea...mostly. But what do I get from food?
I'm past the point where I turn to it for "feelings." That's a big mistake, and I think it's a mistake that is common around the things I'm talking about today. We turn to these things to get feelings, and these things can't give us feelings. We give ourselves feelings. These things only stimulate them. I still associate food with feelings. Especially chocolate, but I no longer turn to food to get the feeling. Now, the feeling is the activity around which the food is presented. Supper with someone special. Feeding (or being fed) a chocolate dipped strawberry. The activity and the company provides the feeling, the food only helps to anchor the memory.
Drugs
Alcohol, pot, cocaine and stronger drugs (for some of us) all give us feelings. There is frequently a very unpleasant feeling (aftermath) that comes with it. Alcohol...hangover. Pot...paranoia and often pot-hangover. Cocaine...OK, well you got me on this one. I guess there's the melancholy when you run out. Crank fries your brain. Heroin is highly addictive (but not as bad as tobacco); it exposes you to a criminal element of society that could place you in danger; and it's largely unsanitary. I hear the high is pretty good though, if you don't mind puking ten minutes into it.

These are all forms of unrequited friendship. We turn to these things looking to ease the pain and turmoil of life. They gives us a short respite, then collect their toll.
Is there a thing we can turn to to ease the pain of life that will give us more, instead of making us pay back? Maybe.
Exercise
Here's the one thing that seems to really give a feeling. For the most part, the more exercise you get, the better you feel. If you overdo it, you might sustain an injury. Barring that, the rule seems to hold true. It's good for you too. Now that I think of it, I should go out and get some.
Happy Sunday friends!

Familiarity is not friendship.

Look at all the different forms of entertainment in which we partake.
Radio and TV talk shows are pretty high on the list. I like Podcasts myself. They're like radio shows for your Ipod and there are thousands of them covering every topic imaginable. I want to talk about the associations we make with these familiar voices.
I'll start with the most popular voice in America, Oprah. Ardent Oprah fans tune in every day to hear her talk about whatever she has to say. A lot of these people feel like they are her friends. They are so tuned in that a certain disconnect from reality occurs. They feel they know her so well that (sometimes) they begin to back-rationalize that she knows them too.
I've seen and heard it happen with local radio personalities too. I've even kinda' had it happen myself with them. I would call in to the morning show of a station in Vacaville with some regularity. They knew who I was by my voice. I even met them when they went out on location. Nice folks. Very friendly. I even got the feeling that one of them would have been willing to date me, were our situations such that it would have been permissible (we were both involved with other people at the time). There, you see? A fine line between familiarity and friendship.
With online message boards you have access to directly communicate with people of greater and greater notoriety. Twitter completely levels the playing field between us (the common folk), and big-time celebrities like Levar Burton, Felicia Day, Gary Fisher and Lance Armstrong. Gary Fisher and Lance Armstrong both regularly post that they are taking rides and if you want to come along, just show up. Gary is a bunch of fun, but if you can't cruise at 25+ MPH, just forget about Lance. Message boards and Twitter crack a door that sometimes can be opened to become friends with these people we wish were our friends. In both the case of Gary Fisher and Lance Armstrong, I have friends who have become their friends through social media. One day, I hope to join their ranks.
Let's look at podcasts. A big name is podcasting is Leo LaPorte. He runs the TWIT network. With over 20 shows he's well known in social media. We follow each other on Twitter, Buzz & Foursquare and we've had some personal interaction via electronic communication of various types (Twitter @msgs, IMs & email). I hear his voice so much on his podcasts and he's so personable that I feel I know him. I would like to be friends with him or anybody like him, but if I ever meet him in person I better remember that to him, I am one of thousands of people who all look the same. He's only the most notable such person. There are many others with whom I've had personal interaction. I have to remember that as public figures, it's their job to be friendly and it would take some special interaction to bridge the gap into friends.
My friend who knows Gary Fisher has been on several rides with him. My friend who knows Lance Armstrong has done some spectacular work for the Livestrong Foundation (Lance's cancer fighting effort). They bridged the gap.
Some people "think" they've bridged the gap, when they haven't. This is probably far more common than any of us realize. Ever watch "Desperate Housewives?" Eva Longoria is one of the lead actors playing Gabrielle Solis. A hot, slutty, ex-model turned mom. You can follow her on Twitter @EvaLongoria. She's there and it's really her. She's on Facebook too. http://www.facebook.com/EvaLongoria Her Facebook page has links to all the public stuff she's into and you can get a look into her life in some detail...and people do. Some think they "know" her after a while with all this exposure. Some even think they've fallen in love with her. Some completely jump the shark and think they've fallen in love with Gabrielle Solis, her fictitious character! Falling in love with a coworker is another form of this same situation.
We don't realize how common this is. I think we all experience it to some degree. Let's hope we have the vision to see that which is real friendship and that which is only familiarity.

Single serving friends.

When I was at the top of Half Dome in Yosemite, my knee was in serious pain. At the time I didn't have much hiking experience and I had just climbed the eight mile path to the top. I was sitting there tying a handkerchief around my knee, when a fellow came up and asked: "Is your knee giving you trouble?" I told him it was and he asked if I wanted to borrow a knee brace. I told him that I would if he had one to lend. Oddly enough, he did. He said that he had brought three. Two for himself and one to lend. He was determined to be a friend to someone that day and I was the lucky guy.
I don't usually need help with repairs on my bike but I constantly see strangers being friends to cyclists. I do it myself with some regularity. Fixing a flat and mending a broken chain are pretty common on the mountainbike trails. If worse comes to worse, I've both towed and been towed out. Then there's the medical situations that occur. Overheating is pretty common. So is bonking from failure to properly fuel up prior to the ride. In both instances I've been the beneficiary and benefactor from and to strangers. Friends of the moment.
I've seen panhandlers handed a meal out the window of a stopped car. I myself will give a buck or two to anyone holding a sign proclaiming:"Why lie? I need a beer." If I have occassion to go into a McDonald's in San Francisco, I always get half a dozen extra double cheeseburgers and hand them out for the next block (if they last that long). I've watched the guys in three-piece suits playing chess with the dregs of society on chess boards sitting atop TV trays for $10 a game...only to toss them a leftover pack of smokes as they walk away, whether they win or lose.
Planting a tree for someone; repairing a house with Habitat for Humanity or just doing a friend-of-a-friend a favor. Dropping a dollar into a street musician's or busker's hat. Filling a gas can at a gas station for someone with no money. Handing off that box of leftover pizza to a street urchin. Helping to push the '87 Chevy off the road. Or just lending an ear for a time at a bar or on a plane.
The world is full of examples of people being friends to strangers. Just like in "Fight Club," these are our Single-serving friends.