Relationships

Wednesday, November 1, 2006

I got an email from a former student and friend the other day. She was talking about friendships and how, in her stage of life, college, it is difficult at times to make the effort towards meaningful friendships because it will all come to an end. I was thinking about that, because I had just earlier been mourning the distance from my closest college friends. Time and geography have created a distance between us, that is true. And yet I don't know if I would have survived college without those dear friends of mine.

They became my lifeline, my family, while I was away from home. We shared deep thoughts, we shared life-changing experience, we became adults together. Even if I had foreseen ahead of time the distance we would now have between us, I would make those friends. My friend's email asked, "What's the point?" I think the point is we need relationships. The reality is that people will always come and go from our lives (and many also stay). But those valuable friendships remain valuable for what was given and received, what was learned, what was experienced together.

I miss my friends. I miss the deepness of relationships that I had in college. I think those relationships are the significant reason so many people look back on college as the best time of their life. I cherish those friends and mourn the closeness we used to have. But I'm glad we had it, and it is a joy when we do have the chance to talk or even better, to see each other.

I have just been reading an article about MySpace.com and other social networking websites. The article contends that one problem with these sites is lazy relationality it promotes. Teens don't want to do the hard work of sitting face to face in real, quality relationships. There is little authenticity, as kids portray themselves not as they are. One teenage girl was even quoted as saying that she prefers that to calling them because she usually just wants to leave a message, since there isn't usually enough to say for a whole conversation. What is that?

We were made for relationships, with God and with other people. We need them and we need them to be meaningful.