An ode to friendship

This is not one blog piece on any one person. It is a collective piece on friendship, what a friend means and how they help weave our stories as part of life’s great tapestry. Relationships with family, partners and siblings are one thing but a friendship is something else. It’s so precious. 

Friends are always there. They have your back in the good times and the bad. They are like an old, comfortable armchair. No matter how many years go by, or how many swish models come into vogue, you know you’re always at ease in that chair. You may not see it for a number of years but when you sit down and succumb to its embrace, the nooks and crannies are so familiar, it’s like being in a time machine because you pick up where you left off. 

Whether our friends are one of the 10 people who shared a three bedroom house in the UK 20 years ago, are one of 50 boarders who attended Genazzano FCJ College, grew up in Sale, are part of the Magnetic Island tribe, or are a member of the Quislings trivia gang. We all have our friendship team. The team needn’t be big but it has to be strong with solid foundations. Each member with their own wonderful, unique traits. Many memorable experiences include sitting atop some of the world’s oldest sand dunes in Namibia, playing 500, laughing hysterically at the Edinburgh Festival, late night musings over red wine (and Ella Fitzgerald), hiking in Romanian hills, dressing up for house parties and sitting amongst the mighty red and blue in the Members at the MCG, our ‘home’. It is having lunch at Headquarters with ‘Big Tone’ and sitting in peaceful silence amongst angels of Zuzu sharing unspoken words. 

As someone who has worked in the public service I empathise with Don Watson’s view of corporate speak. ‘Social capacity,’ what the hell is that? Sounds ridiculous but I think the concept has currency. Friends build resilience, and help you to cope in the darkest of hours. Problem shared, problem halved as wise Aunt Lorraine often says.

They are the ones with whom you can have those brutal conversations. They love you for all your quirks, your insecurities and they understand what makes you tick. They can tell you to pull your head in when it’s needed and ultimately, you respect them for the open, forthright communication. Of course no one likes to hear it, but who respects a coach who says you’ve done a fantastic job after you’ve given away two consecutive 50m penalties? Acquaintances are different. Acquaintances come and go. You’re hardly going to repeat a conversation you had with your heart with someone you barely know. True friends are present, and allow you to be vulnerable, to be truly emotionally naked. 

Montaigne the French essayist has some cracking views on people and subjects alike. He captures friendship so vividly. I’d like to share the following passage which gives me shivers every time I read it (with apologies to Alain de Botton’s The Consolations of Philosophy):   

What we normally call friends and friendships are no more than acquaintances and familiar relationships bound by some chance or some suitability, by means of which our souls support each other. In the friendship which I am talking about, souls are mingled and confounded in so universal a blending that they efface the seam which joins them together so that it cannot be found.

When we’re on our own we can soar, though the wind can buffet us. When our friendship team is together we form Voltron and we’re unstoppable. As the late great Jim Stynes said, imagine what you can achieve when you take fear away. You can thrive, be swept up in the euphoria of life, all the while doing so in a safe, supported space. There are some friends that have you at hello (or in my case ‘latte’), while there are other times when a bit of magic happens and it’s just meant to be.

Twenty-five years ago I entered the Genazzano boarding house and shared a room with a tall, lanky, red-headed girl from Bairnsdale with a frank personality. Today I’m privileged to call Catherine my best friend, my Diana Barry. 

What a journey we’ve all had so far. Only recently a few of us sat around a table, shared in-jokes, recounted fond memories and wrote letters to ourselves to be placed in a time capsule and opened after three years. I wonder how we’ll change (or not) in that time. I’m not sure what the future has in store, but bring on life with all its ups and downs I say. We’ll tackle it head on by embracing the glorious days and giving the finger to the not so glorious ones, that includes you COVID-19. 

This is an ode to friendship, to my friends. 

I am blessed. I have the best. 

Sarah Ryan