When I Need A Pick Me Up, by my friend Ryan King

Tuesday, May 8, 2007

Friendship vs. Me

(Originally 8/27/06)

My Benefactor's Son wanted me to drive out and pick up some Pork Fried Rice for him. At first it sounded like he wanted me to take him somewhere, to which I immediately said no. He was asking as I was blogging the last post, so you can imagine I was in no mood. Then I listened to his actual request and considered that I was being pissy because of my mood, so I went out and picked up the damn Fried Rice for him.

But I still felt I had to clarify something with him. His father wants me to call the police if he has his friends over, and I'm just nasty enough to do it--especially if they've got the bong bubbling and nicotine stench drifting down into my space. But I didn't think HE believed I would. In fact he keeps telling me how fascinated his friends are with me, who lives in his father's basement.

Yes, I admit, I am an oddity. But these boys want to add me to their My Space and all sorts of stuff. (I told them the My Space address, but you can best believe I took the link to this blog off of it.) So I am instantly thrown into my own head and nothing but negativity starts boiling out.

Friendship.

What the hell IS it?

To me, friendship is a two-way street, if it's real. For instance, I heart Feedback. I support him, I identify with him, I admire him, I hero-ize him. I feel very friendly toward him and his life. He has value to me on this earth. While I might call him a friend--HE IN NO WAY HAS ANY OBLIGATION TO RETURN THE SAME. He doesn't know me, per se. He can read the representation of my thoughts and feelings here on the blog and formulate an opinion about me, the way I've done to him, but he doesn't have to call me his "friend" if he doesn't come up with the same conclusions that I have about him. That's what I believe.

But what if my belief is wrong?
If so then I really don't know what friendship is about. And I'll tell you why. (I may have done in my previous blog, but it bears repeating now.)

When I moved to Spring Valley as a little mutant, I tried to make friends. I was lonely, an only child, with a single working parent. (Also, from a 30+ years-in-the-future perspective, I also know that I was a sexually abused child.) I tried to connect with other people. But trust was not a major skillset I possessed.

My neighborhood was rife with multifamily bullies. Brothers and little sisters full of anger and rage. Me the oddball. Did I get picked on? Did I get ostracized? Did I get beat up? Check, check and check. So I formed a shield and only permitted a select few into my affections.

One was the junior highschool playboy with conquests as long as a fleet of Donald Trump's limousines. He seemed to like me, and I certainly admired/mancrushed on him.

Another was the transplanted southern athletic oddball, who stood out because of how dark his skin was. Yes, back then, we black people had the nerve to prejudice against one another because of our OWN skin color. Ain't that some mess? But this guy was muscular and half-crazy, and he certainly got more than his fair share of poonani, and he also seemed to like me. So we were friends. We travelled all over Spring Valley having little exploratory adventures. He taught me how to eat wild grapes and get to Nanuet along the train tracks.

Another was the wisecracking guy. We were really good friends. He killed me with laughter. I learned many a verbal defense from him. We used to hang out at his apartment all the time, and I ate many a dinner with his family. I thought of him as my best friend. And it wasn't a mancrush at all. I saw him like I saw myself and he made me feel so dang good with his sense of humor. Then one day I got selfish about some kind of comicbook trade or something or other, and broke his heart. I showed him what I monster I could be. He never trusted me again. Nothing was the same since.

And of course there is This Guy, and there is His Older Sister. He was/is the geek within myself. We met on an intellectual plane and he helped me dream my way out of the ghetto we lived in. We trade(d) science fiction novels. I learned who Jose Phillip Farmer was through him, and also what anthologies were. I learned what the Nine Princes of Amber were through him. His sister was the scorning, teasing Big Sister I didn't have, casting an eye over our geekdom. (Mind you, she and I are the same age and I'm a year older than he). Their mother adopted me. They fed me. They love me. They are the only ones from those days who I still keep in touch with and with whom I feel quite a lot of affection for.

Those were my friends from the apartments. In school I had a group of girls I hung out with because I had a major crush on one of them and never got the guts to ask her out, so we remained friends.

Then there were the church people, who were by definition "family". I made a friend out of my Pastor, although he was unable emotionally (and I think culturally) to return the connection. I had a father-figure friend who took a great interest in my well-being. He worked out and was 20 years my senior. Mancrush. I also idolized his son, who was quite an inappropiate gigolo. (See the pattern here? Big virile sexually active dudes. I wish I knew then what I know know. But what did they see in me??)

In every case, and as what will happen eventually within every human relationship, we let each other down sometimes. We hurt each other's feelings. We turned on each other. And then we'd reunite.

My problem was, I lost a little something each time we'd reunite. The pain of conflict was so deep and the scars on my ability to trust became so thick, I lost small measures of affection every time we had a falling out. I would work overtime to avoid it happening, but happen it would.

And that's how I've been living for the past 20 years. I might find myself desiring friendship from a person but my emotional makeup causes me to keep them at arm's length. I want to rush into their arms for that brotherly hug, but I fear the pain of rejection. I distrust more than I trust. That's just how I feel.

So the Benefactor's Son wants to be my friend? Someone 23 years my junior, who smokes pot and refuses to address me as anything else but "Yo"?

And the Benefactor's Son's friends want to add me to their My Space accounts because they're fascinated with me, a loser who lives in their friend's father's basement?

And the Benefactor himself wants to be my friend? While I'm totally dependent on him (a crackhead) and he holds over my own cracked-head the power of life or destitution?

Friends with ME?

I just don't believe that they know who I AM. Without that, how can I accept them into my life as a 'friend'?

Am I wrong? Like the math situation, I need some feedback (o_O) here.

Help me out.

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