shabalife

Friends are Your Family, Too

A couple weeks ago a few of my friends and I gathered around my TV to watch home movies that I recorded on some of our camping trips from last summer. After the laughter ended and we said our good-byes, I stumbled upon a few videos that I had recorded from when I first moved to Colorado four years ago. On the videos I saw some of my old friends that I no longer have contact with. At that time, they were very important people in my life. Since I had no family out here, my friends became my surrogate family. I videotaped Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas and other random activities that we found amusing enough to film.
Watching the videos sparked memories and feelings that I had completely forgotten about. After discussing my video treasure with my friend Jill, she asked, "Isn't it weird to think that those people played an important role in your life at that time, and now you don't even know where they are?" This question has plagued my mind ever since.
We have friends that fulfill certain needs at specific moments in our life. "Friends are the family you make", so there's no absolute commitment to them. Some people come into our life to teach us something, and I believe that once we are done learning from them, we move on and someone new enters our world.
I am saddened at times thinking about the people in my life whom I considered to be a huge influence on me at some point in my life and realizing that we will (most likely) never speak again. But even through the bad times that I’ve experienced with some of my friends, I still emerge learning a valuable lesson from them. After a while, I tend to forget about the bad and only remember the good, because that's what friendship is all about--having some laughs, sharing some great stories and making memories, regardless of how long you remain in each other’s lives.

posted by erin @ 6:35 PM