FRIEND: Why are you friends with them?

 

EMERSON: I… I don’t know… I’mloyalandIwouldneverwannahurtyou but Ialso – youknow Ialso –

 

And that’s usually how the conversation ends. The question remains unanswered, and the more I’m pressed, the further I’m dropped into an identity crisis: 

 

“Am I… a bad person?,” EMERSON wonders. 

 

That is what they say: a friend to all is a friend to none. 

Evidently, the why is what gets me. Trying to find the why summons a bottomless pit of thoughts. A million sub-whys. A million darts that hit the dartboard… never on target. When I squeeze a why out… albeit never fully complete, I’m thrown back into a spiral when I realize there’s a problem: declaring a why misconveys who I am. 

Responding with a why appears to justify disloyalty and confirm that I am, in effect, “a friend to all”. That is NOT who I am. I’m not disloyal. I’m NOT a “friend to all”, nor am I a friend to none. My friends are specially chosen. Beyond that, I’m constantly driven to prove my loyalty to the people I choose; I think, above everything else, that shows. 

However, that IS the question: how can I feel so loyal to my friends, and yet talk, or even go so far as to be a “friend to all”. 

To start, I think labeling me a “friend to all” understates my personal definition of friendship. Choosing people is different from being friends with somebody. It’s true: I share bonds with a lot of people. I tend to harbor positive feelings about a lot of people. I also don’t often avoid or actively dislike a lot of people. All this, and yet, I know exactly where my loyalties lie. My loyalty to those I choose has never been a question for me.

As opposed to choosing people, being friends with somebody feels instinctual. I treat people the way I do without thinking… without intentions… without real motivation. When reduced to a goldfish brain, including people, trusting people, and dismissing my personal judgements is what I do, or, at least, passively try to do. I don’t perceive it as an act of disloyalty because I don’t perceive it as an act at all.

Thus, answering with a why undercuts the fact that there really isn’t a why. It’s all a matter of who I am at my “emptiest”… and there’s no why in emptiness. However, while I decline the implications of a why, there exists some historical context as to how I developed these instincts. 

I’ve faced mostly trivial hardships in all areas except one: my social life. Feeling excluded has been a constant for me, beginning as early as my elementary school summer camp. No one treated me exceptionally poorly, but when it seemed there was no external reason people weren’t including me, I couldn’t help but nurture the impression that there was a deeper reason: myself. I was certain it was at least a little bit my fault people didn’t “like me”. Thus, a life of enduring exclusion from others has won me a long receipt of insecurities about myself. I’m still paying that receipt, even as I acclimate to college and make increasingly meaningful friendships. 

Both then and now, inclusion means so much to me. I’ve been the one facing the consequences of another person’s choice. Now that I’m the one choosing, I act in accordance to what I’ve desired most my whole life. At the very back of my mind, inclusion will always be an incredibly attractive quality: it will almost never be a ‘bad’.

Thus, in a goldfish headspace, this value is projected into the world. In goldfish terms: 

 

EMERSON (as GOLDFISH): Glub, glub, I want that.

 

And that’s it. In a goldfish headspace, I know nothing except my personal, innermost desires: I want to be given grace, included, respected, forgiven, etc, etc. 

Point being, I don’t know why exactly I’m “friends with them”. I don’t really have a why. I just do it because it’s a projection of what I want for myself. Am I a bad person? I don’t know – but can you really be mad at a goldfish?