FRIENDSHIP

-->Anais Nin put it beautifully when she said, "Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born."

Defying the obvious overlapping and gray areas, I find it interesting to think of friendships as they fit the following catagories:

The timeless or forever friend

The “what if” friend – If only we had more time to get to know each other….

The convenient - circumstantial friend

The not quite friend

The spiritual friend

The good time friend

The friend who makes me laugh

The refrigerator friend

The family friend

The shared or mutual friend

The mentor friend

The opposite sex friend

The colleague friend

The common interest friend

The life event friend

In my seventy-four years I have had friends move in and out of my life, the course of our friendship determined by our shifting circumstances.  Most of the time we have lost touch with one another, relying on memories to sustain the kinship.  Recently, with the aid of modern social networks, I have been able to re-connect with some of these friends from the past, and that is pure delight.

 

This was a very unique group of friends.  They visited me (hat and sunglasses) when I was diagnosed with measles in my sophomore year of high school.  I think they were hoping to catch the measles bug so they could stay home from school.  That did not happen.

YOU LITTLE BASTARD

That was me…I was the little bastard. Let me explain…

From kindergarten through high school my best friend was Richie Genoni. We were Richie and Billy, Rich or Richard, and Bill came much later. Richie and his family lived on his grandfather’s farm about a quarter mile up the road from ours, and directly on the way to school, so we shared part of the daily walk to and from school until middle school (Junior High in those days), and a bus ride for the next 3 years. Our educational careers diverged in high school when he went to the area’s catholic school, but our friendship persisted.

Richie was an athlete, and was active in baseball and basketball in high school and in the local Babe Ruth league. For those of you who know me, this may be hard to believe, but I was not an athlete, and my participation in scholastic sports consisted of 2 years of basketball in Jr. High. Richie was a varsity starter while I was JV or second/third team varsity. Although I did win a varsity game once with a tremendous basket as the buzzer sounded, but that’s another story. Like most athletes, Richie was very competitive, while I was not. When he played, it was to win, when I played it was to have fun. And we played…especially basketball, since we both had a basket set up in our yards…usually 0-U-T or H-O-R-S-E. Now on an even playing field I was no match for Richie…he was taller, more athletic, and had a better jump shot than me…but I had one thing in my favor…laughter. I could make him laugh whenever I wanted to, and of course I wanted to when he was ready to take his shot. And hence the name calling as between fits of laughter he managed to yell…”you little bastard”. There were occasions when my victories where the result of pure skill, or more likely, pure luck, when I made some incredibly difficult shot that he could not duplicate. When that happened “you little bastard” lost much of its affection.

He was a good friend.


Richie and me


Measles and me...
In my Jr. year in HS I came down with the measles. My friends quickly gathered around me hoping that they would get infected and have to stay home from shcool.

from left to righ: Richie Genoni, a very debonair yours truly, Dukie Tromello, and Billy Mattioli.