The easiest thing is not building a new friendship, it’s destroying an old one and there are a hundred and one ways where friendships crumble.
A couple of years back I heard this story of a friend taking friendship to ’new heights.’ His friend was to go abroad on a year’s scholarship. He tells his friend to look after his girlfriend.
When he returns they will tie the knot. A year passes and the guy comes back home. It was going to be one hell of a welcoming experience with his girlfriend; well that wasn’t the case. His friend has married his girlfriend! That wasn’t all; she was expecting!
Someone drops the bombshell. “She is married…
“Married! What do you mean married!
“Well, that is what happened…”
“Who did she marry?”
“Well…hmmm. I…”
What is wrong with you! I asked you a question; who did she marry.”
“Your friend…”
Suddenly, that poor guy wouldn’t know who to trust; if your best friend, the very person you trust your life with, the very person you thought would keep an eyes on your girlfriend and keep her safe, throws
you under the bus you lose confidence in humanity. Your philosophy genes spring into action: “It’s better to live with wild animals than with human beings!” The rest it up to the ‘Action’ genes!
I knew a guy who never lends money to friends and relatives, not even a cent. Not that he was a miser or anything close to that. He was just being cautious. He believed that money was the reason for relationships going down south. You’d expect him to get the standing ovations. Well, I’ve news for you; it was the other way around. His reputation hit Rock bottom; few appreciated his position; the near unanimous consensus was that he was a miser!
How can you be a miser or anything for refusing to lend money to someone else? Lending is not about being the nicest human being; it is about beliefs, it’s about digging your own foxhole
Say, there’s this guy fond of inviting his friends. When he has the money his friends don’t have to worry who’d foot the bill for the weekend beer. This continues for months. All of a sudden he stops; not because he had a change of heart but his income dried out. He was struggling to put three meals a day on his family’s dining table. But no one would be willing to sympathize with his position.
If you’re such a guy, you’re practically pinned to the wall; not because your behavior has changed; but because you have stopped things you have been doing, and for plausible reasons too. You have stopped throwing your hard earned money on friends who don’t want you anywhere near them unless you’re the one footing the bill.
Unless you’re the one who never says, “Guys I think you’ve enough.” Most relationships people think are ‘true friendship’ are anything but that. They are sort of commercial ventures where the money comes out of one pocket and ends up in a lot of bellies and blood streams.
You’ve loaned too many friends and the emptiness of your pockets is doing injustice to your fingers which are craving for the touch of a few hundred birr notes. The friends you lent money to have started crossing to the other side of the road started when they see you.
Nothing gives you more hiccups than such stabs in the back by the very people you thought you were helping. Say by some twist of fate you run into one of them.
“Don’t you it is high time you settled your debt?”
“Ok; Ok; I’ll pay! What do you think I am: A crook?”
You never said that. You never implied or
suggested he’s a crook or anything like that. But since he raised it could be interesting topic.
“It’s five months overdue.”
“So what! It is only five months and you sound as if you have given me a million birr!!
Never lent any money to anyone? Well, you’re the lucky one.
What are you doing to solve the problem?
The funny part is sometimes when friendships go bust committees are formed to bring the disputing sides. A committee for a couple of ego-driven guys who could have sorted out everything over a few beers! A waste of energy and precious time.
Who cares! I mean when two friends bump heads over some silly and unimportant thing and they expect a committee to come to the rescue, you know things are very wrong with the thinking of some of us.
Well, we have set up the committee. Sometimes that a committee has been formed is like being told to jump out of the nearest window; “Hey Count Dracula is knocking on your door!” Because a committee means another squeeze on your very tight budget as things are supposed to be ‘celebrated’ with raw meat and drinks, a lot of it too!
The Ethiopian Herald January 31/2021