I don't have a best-friend

MANILA, Philippines - Perhaps the most awkward thing Facebook has ever suggested we do is to publicly identify our “close friends.”  This easily poses a few problems, one of them being the possibility of assuming you’re close to someone when they actually think of you more casually. While we cast doubt upon “relationships” in which someone dubiously suggests you don’t label anything, I think friendship generally requires this condition. It’s the kind of thing you’re supposed to just know and enjoy without freaking the other person out by having to verify, “What are we?”

And perhaps that’s why I haven’t had a best friend since high school. One day, I decided it was too uncomfortably mushy and clingy to be labeling things. Friends were friends.

Sino ba talaga ang best?

I also realized that 1) I couldn’t decide who was the best, and 2) there was no such thing as a friend for all occasions. The empathetic girl friend whom I rant to when I just want to be a complicated woman who is feeling whatever she is feeling is not the same person I talk to when I want a calm and detached perspective, or the hard, matter-of-fact truth. Sometimes I want clarity, to know what I’m doing wrong, and sometimes it’s been a hard day and I just want to be validated.

I have artist friends who infect me with their boundless passion, financial genius friends who talk to me about stocks, tough girl friends who continually inspire me to be independent, girl friends who almost mother me, guy friends around whom I can comfortably assume a more spoiled disposition, and guy friends who do not get that they’re supposed to roll with my inconsistencies and readily forgive me for being late, but I find their inflexibility amusing anyway. I love all of them differently. I don’t have one person who knows all my secrets. I choose who to open up to depending on what I need or crave at the moment.

I like appreciating the connections I make without having to qualify them or compare them to what I have with other people. Sometimes I experience depth with another person while talking about absolutely inane things, like family background and pets. Some of my most profound relationships are with people I see once in several months, because we both work hard at pursuing our dreams, and for some reason that’s all the time we need — but when we do plan to meet, we set it in stone and make it good. Sometimes it’s liberating to confide in someone I don’t really hang out with just because we happened to go out that night, grab a few beers, and he/she’s actually pretty cool.

No need for contracts

It’s hard to put labels or assign degrees of intensity to the friendships I have because closeness varies with time and the situation. Sometimes people disappear and others reemerge, and I’m fine with that. Sometimes you find that you no longer know your high school best friend, but the org mate you kind of ignored in college is now your most regular food trip buddy. Some people despair when intimacy vanishes, reasoning that “May pinagsamahan kami,” but personally I don’t like to treat friendships like contracts. Just because you went through a lot together, it doesn’t mean things always have to stay the same and that you are now joined at the hip ‘til death do you part. Sometimes people grow apart and that’s all there is to it. It doesn’t mean it wasn’t real, or that they’re bad people who are now taking you for granted. And if you’re aware enough, this also usually means that you’ve found new friends who are more appropriate to what you’re currently going through in life. And if at your deathbed, you find someone who has actually stuck with you ‘til the end, then that would be a great privilege to have. But I wouldn’t consider it a requirement. I prefer to let things fall into their place and have people give only what they really want to give.

I guess the main reason why I don’t have a best friend is because I feel like I can continuously find that in a lot of people. This requires a huge faith in humanity. If you’re convinced that the world is a bad place full of people who are out to get you, then this probably isn’t for you. Some people prefer to exclusively invest in one or the few who have been tried and tested, and there’s nothing wrong with that.  I’m not here to tell people the right way to have relationships.

But personally, I don’t do that because somehow I’m pretty damn sure that everywhere I go, I can be myself, find people who will appreciate this authenticity, and be just as real in return. Some people who claim to be “real” complain about constantly being surrounded by fakes, and I find that it’s them I’m worried about. We inspire those around us to be what they are, whether we’re aware of it or not. I’m better at being unguarded and tactless than polished to perfection, so I’m guessing this makes it hard and cumbersome for whoever I’m talking to to continue to hold on to their pretentions. I don’t meet a lot of fake people. They only pretend when they feel like they have to. And while it’s true that the world does have its population of assholes and weirdoes, I haven’t been disappointed so far. There’s still always someone new and worthwhile to get to know, to discover you can trust and share things with. I don’t have a best friend because I’m convinced that the world is full of them. And whether it’s one inuman night or miraculously the rest of our lives, meaningful connections are meaningful connections.

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