With Friends Like These

You can't choose your parents, they say.

But you can definitely choose your friends.

In the time I've spent breathing, I've been fortunate enough to have been surrounded by generally nice people to call my minio - I mean, people. I remember the ones I've long since lost touch with, those I went to school with before the Internet made the world such a smaller place. I'm talking even before IRC and ICQ. I'm talking Windows 3.1.

But I can say that the ones I still talk to, those from school, the army, random people, have made my world that much more interesting. Of course, we've all had our conflicts. I've yelled at friends in the past (and have been yelled at because of some friends), more than once, and other, less vocal but nonetheless more intense disagreements have occurred many a time. Still, I'm happy with what I have, I can't really complain.

I can hardly recall what my primary school friends look like. Perhaps it's got something to do with the fact that I didn't wear glasses back then, even though I needed to. I do remember silly games that boys played before they hit puberty, just when they were starting to learn the meaning of sex. No, not those kinds of games.

I remember running a friend's house, playing Doom and football in his study, breaking the lights. Engaging in the guilty pleasures of watching a particular Japanese cartoon and talking about how cool it was with a classmate. Going all the way to Toa Payoh about once a week to play single-player Counterstrike on the PC. Entertaining some who made it their goal in life to beat me at FIFA 99, not leaving my place till after dinner. Being surprised with a birthday present (and a little cake) on someone else's birthday because they missed mine. Sudden phone calls from multiple people when someone hears I might be upset over something.

Unfortunately, some try too hard to hold on to friendships. It's like pulling a cactus out of quicksand. The harder you try, the more you bleed. And eventually, you sink to the bottom as well.

OK, that wasn't very poetic, forgive me.

But friends are supposed to be the ones who make you feel better, the ones who give you something to laugh about, smile about, joke about, think about. Not the ones who annoy you to no end, who do nothing but belittle your beliefs, who put up a facade and spread insidious half-truths about their so-called "friends".

It's too bad some can't really see this.

Someone once told someone else that they were too nice "to a fault", and that "you've never really lived, until you've hated". While this might sound pessimistic, at best, it's kinda true in its own twisted way. Nice guys (and girls) finish last may not be the most accurate motto to build the foundation of your character on, but its true to a certain extent.

The term "you deserve better" rings truer than usual for two people in particular right now, and perhaps to more who are reading this.

Stop trying and hoping to salvage anything when there is nothing left to salvage.