I was bordering on the edge of insanity one afternoon because a certain invoice amounting to more than a million USD could not get posted due to some difference. The vendor would go bankrupt if we did not get it included in the payment run the next morning, so I sent off messages to different officemates to check if the workarounds I was thinking could possibly work.
Three of the leads I had came to a dead end, and just when I thought the only solution was to do hara-kiri, my friend who is a business support specialist (BSS) but who is not supposed to support my market, came over to ask why I had sent him an instant message.
I told him about my issue, and without even asking if I had already logged a ticket for this, he took over my desktop and proceeded to resolve the issue. My other friend who was a former BSS also came over to help. There were about 300 line items to wade through, but at the end of the hour, the issue was resolved. Whew!
What would I have done if I didn’t have friends to lean on? They certainly make things easier in this world. And if you have even just one close friend, you can consider yourself lucky already. On that note, then, I am one incredibly lucky girl.
But what is the definition of a close friend? Is she that person you always have lunch with? Or your teammate, because you’re literally close to each other? Or is it everyone in your gang, whom you always hang out with?
In college, I wrote a letter for one of my classmates back in those days when closeness could be measured by who were your constant rowmates in every class. I told her, “Closeness is not determined by proximity. Even though we never sit next to each other and therefore are not close literally, it does not mean that we are not close.”
A few years later, I gave a Christmas card to my roommate who had been my kabarkada (and my rowmate) since College. I told her, “Back in College, even though we were part of the same barkada, I did not really consider you as a close friend. I am so glad, then, that we took that risk in coming to Manila, because it was only here that I had the chance to be close to you.”
I realized this was also applicable to the working world when I had this conversation with a friend. I told him, “But aren’t you and *** close friends? After all, you’re always together.” He asked me if I was close to my teammate ***. I said no, not really. He said, “See, that’s how *** and I are too. We’re always together, like you and ***, but it doesn’t mean we’re close.”
Another friend gave me an inkling of the definition of a close friend when he told me and our other friend, “Do you know that you are my first close friends in P&G?” I was quite amazed to know this because I know he has batchmates and lunchmates that he talks to and hangs out with so much more than he does with us. He acknowledged this, but added, “But you’re the first friends I could share my woes to.”
So your close friends are not your rowmates or batchmates or lunchmates or teammates or housemates and not even your gang.
Your close friends are those people whom you share not just laughter with, but also tears; those people who are by your side to lend a hand or an ear even before you ask for it, and will not ask for anything in return.
They are the people whom you gave a piece of your heart to, the ones who, if you had to part ways, will take that same piece of your heart with them as they go. So you make sure to keep in touch always because your heart will not be whole anymore if you let them go.
But I suppose the simplest definition of a close friend for me is this – someone you can say “I love you” to.