Winning Words 4/13/11
“A friend is one before whom I may think aloud.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson) I have a habit of referring to someone I know as “a friend of mine.” One of my children will correct me (as children sometimes do) by saying, “That’s an acquaintance, not a friend.” RWE had it right, too. Most of us have just a few friends with whom we can have “safe” conversations. Do friends on Facebook count as friends?. ;-) Jack

FROM BG IN MICHIGAN: You are my friend, Jack. FROM JACK: I appreciate our "think aloud" times together. MORE FROM BG: Ditto. They are a life line for me…

FROM ILLINOIS LIZ: Friends on Facebook just "count," I think. It's not only the kids who like to see how many friends they can "rack up." FROM JACK: I have a Facebook account, but I don't how many friends (if any) are listed on it. I do know that I have "friends" like you on my Winning Words address list. MORE FROM LIZ: Me, too. And I am amazed at the things people write for the world to see!

FROM SH IN MICHIGAN: My mother-in-law told me, after my father-in-law died, that the hardest thing was that she didn't have someone she could "gossip" to. It took her a while to learn she could "gossip" to us others. And actually whatever things she says aren't all that ugly. They had a very good marriage. I've found a weekly prayer evening at church with God and a few friends to also be a safe place to think aloud and ask for help for all the people we need to talk about. FROM JACK: The Quakers, aka Friends, call their gatherings "Friends Meetings." It seems like you've found something like that at your church.

FROM EB: Ain't that the truth! FROM JACK: I sometimes wonder if your request to send WWs to leaders in your congregation ever results in discussions on a particular subject. This simply a "wondering" and not necessarily a request for an answer.

FROM DB IN MICHIGAN: I totally agree! p.s. its also important for us to remember who our true friends are, and to give them the extra special treatment and respect that they deserve! I cannot understand why people are more concerned with giving "their best" to strangers and not to "friends" and family. FROM JACK: Often it's a "situation" that causes a separation of the sheep from the goats, the real friends and the others. P.S. We'll never be able to understand the "why" of some personalities, but we can control our own behavior (except in those times described by St. Paul: "The good that I would, I do not; and the evil that I would not, that I do.") Life can be frustrating, at times.

FROM A FRIEND WHO TELLS IT LIKE IT IS: .....thanks" friend",you've gotten it right. If you ever "published"
some of the s--t I've either shared, emailed you or spoken in conversations with you, I'd be either arrested, defrocked, certainly embarrased .......but the bright side of my current memory deficit is that I can't remember most of it. FROM JACK: ...and neither can I.

FROM TAMPA SHIRL: BFF is the sort of new phrase that made the rounds down here a few years ago. The main difference today is that families move so often compared to our generation growing up. FROM JACK: We have to understand that Hello and Goodbye come pretty close together these days.

FROM CJL IN OHIO: I would doubt it....tho I don't have one. Friends are very few; Facebook has a lot. FROM JACK: It's pretty hard to "think aloud" on Facebook.

FROM MOLINER CF: FaceBook is a good way to stay in touch with strangers. FROM JACK: Yo-Yo Ma said: "Good things happen when you meet strangers. " Someone I know met his wife, sight unseen, on the internet, and it worked out.

FROM AM IN MICHIGAN: To paraphrase RWE, if one has one good friend in a lifetime, he is fortunate. I must wander through Emerson and find those lines. FROM JACK: I did a quick search, but didn't find it. Ralph did leave us with many good sayings, though.

FROM BLAZING OAKS: I don't do facebook, but I remember someone saying that if you have five good friends in a lifetime, you are blessed...I feel I have been blessed! But your children are right...most of our interaction is more with acquaintances than dear and close friends! I remember once when Sarah (my youngest) was just in grade school, I mentioned that my good friend Donna,with whom I taught school, was coming over that evening to help me wrap my choir Christmas presents, and she responded, "She's coming over, with our house in a mess like this?! She MUST be a good friend!" Exactly...and she still is! :-) FROM JACK: Sometimes we have a good friend and don't know it. A man once went to a funeral home to "pay his respects." He was surprised when a relative came up to him and said, "You were one of his closest friends."