I’m thinking of a word, it is 10 letters long and there’s always some form of enough it to go around. Another hint? It has nothing to do with politics or competition... ok its friendship. It’s easy to say you have lots of friends in the world, because you could even consider someone you said hello to at the mall one time a friend, or “acquaintance”. Friendship, described in the dictionary as harmony and understanding, I can just picture the pretty music and butterflies that should float around this definition. So how do you know if someone’s really your friend? Well... you could look around for harmony and understanding, which sounds a little... odd to me, or you could just be friends with everyone.

Being a girl, the best thing about socializing is knowing how few people really are friends, and also knowing that there are always stories going around that are manufactured by people who aren’t your friends. I would love to create a story about me helping an elderly citizen across the street and tell a few people, just to see how far it gets before I start hearing about how I saved the planet in three days. A little ridiculous right? Maybe, but how many stories really get embellished beyond recognition? A good tip is if you don’t hear something right from the source, you might be hearing the saving the world version. Gossip is an example of “non-friendship” as I would like to call it, or the product of mean talk being produced by people outside of your “friendship circle”.

The funny thing about friendship is the fact that you never really have to accept an invitation to be friends, or have a true discussion about it. Relationships have their outlines, regulations and generally one half eventually asks the other out, but I’ve not heard many instances of formally asking for someone’s hand in friendship. This gives you the freedom to float around different groups, you’re not bound to be with all of your friends at once and you can get away with just saying hello to most people. Best friends are where the real meat is added to the bone, this is the declaration of true acceptance as a personal favorite person. I’m not sure if everyone has best friends, or if that ends when you turn 18, I guess I’ll find out. But always remember that “best friend” is a permanent contract unless it is properly rejected and discarded of.