"Since you call me a friend, I'd like to know if you have that as a general guideline or is it more because we certainly share similar characteristics?All the best!Your friend. (O.)
What is a friend?
Good question. I already replied to Coffeebuyer O directly. But the question made me think.
Why is this word “friend” so important to me?
I didn't have a lot of "friends" growing up.
But I was lucky to have been born in 1946 and grow up where I did in a neighborhood which was very diverse. Not racially mixed - but with kids from all the social strata.
I was obviously "different". I looked different, acted differently, and never quite "fit" in.
But that was OK, until high school at least. Kids were freer in those days, we didn’t have the kind of social pressures kids have to endure today, being prepared for an MBA from kindergarten — especially over-parenting.
So we walked to school and played in the bush and the parks at night and got muddy and dirty and did all sorts of thing that would invite visits from Social Services today. By today’s standards, my parents should have been in jail.
Young animals of a most mammalian species are pretty accepting when young -- the lion does lie down with the lamb.
Sexual maturity (or is it immaturity?) changes things of course. Not just parental pressures but peer group pressures.
In any case, my particular form of ASD affects the way I communicate -- which I didn't really learn to do until I left (escaped from) home after graduating high school and found a therapist who could teach me to talk intelligibly—a, b, c, d , e— rather than a, b, x, y, 1, 2, 4, y. Straight line finite sentences, rather than the other kind.
My "friends" from high school on were all outliers in one way or another. All "different".
Of course, some of what I am saying applies to EVERYONE!
Everyone is unique
In some sense, we are all “outliers”— which is why our society spends so much energy regimenting us and teaching us to conform. We are all square pegs beaten into round holes.
The fact is that EVERYONE is "different" - just some people are more aware of it than others—the ones who can’t learn to tie their shoelaces or spell or read. The awareness thing is a matter of degree. Also the size of the hole you are being forced into.
Robin Dunbar, the anthropologist that I often site, looks at it this way....
I think of my "coffeebuyers' as "friends". I try to write a message to every person who buys me coffee and sign it “Your friend, Julian”).
Friends? I haven’t met any of you, I haven’t talked over coffee or beer or whatever. I don’t know what most people look like.
But you are friends.There is a bond, a connection.
You buy me coffee and support me, which really helps because I have almost no savings and no income anymore— If I lived in Canada I would be on social welfare! Each coffee is a sign that I am doing something of value to others, gives me purpose in life and encourages me to keep on thinking and writing.
Each coffee is a gesture, a "thumbs-up" —or as Chappy and Ichi put it “paws up”— which means that I did something you value -- with the one thing I can give you, my thoughts, using the few gifts that nature has blessed me with.
So I try to respond to each coffee with a message - a personal, individualized message.
My "coffee friends" obviously share something of my view of events, which means you share something of my view of the world -- not that YOUR view of the world is identical to mine —thank god! —it is different.
The messages I get are warm and friendly. I feel connection emotionally -- I feel empathy--from these people I have never met. Is that not a wonderful thing?
Substack did me a favor by screwing up the Paid Subscription service so I can't use it!
Going back to the question from Coffeebuyer O. there is no "guideline" to friendship in my case. It is a feeling thing - an animal thing— that is hard to articulate.
You are all my friends, a "super family", at the very least a "clan" ; maybe a tribe!
But I am not the "leader". Everyone is a leader.
Does that make sense?
Your friend, with love and respect
Julian
(The Toilet Guy)
We are all different!
Once again, thank you all.
If you would like to support Chappy and Ichi and that Guy, you can buy them coffee by clicking here!
I'm sorry I can't afford to buy you a coffee or 3 at the current time Julian. But I will do as soon as my finances slightly improve. I'm a man of my word & read your every post. For what it's worth, I do give a thumbs up at all times. Friends are people you can talk to & have similar views, things in common. For that reason we are pen friends. Like you I also love animals. Although I was above average intelligence in my school years. I had big problems with authority. Mainly because I like to do things for myself. As a small child for all my parents gave me what they could afford to. I didn't have a very close relationship with my mother. My older brother got that attention. My father worked every hour he could. I was very good at sports & achieved a lot sports wise. But only achieved what I felt like achieving academically. As usual I gained the qualifications I have now independently on my own. That authority thing has never left me. So much so I'm a qualified manager in my field of work. But prefer to work at trade level. Can you imagine someone hating authority that much. That I refuse a higher salary & have always done as a manager because of it? In many cases I'm more qualified than all management on the jobs I work on. Being the age I am, I'm the most experienced also. That's a short bio of myself. I thought you should know being a friend of mine.
My childhood pastimes mirror yours. I was born in Oregon in 1953. My strict parents would be answering questions from a social worker if I were a child today.
Word senses are confounding. Rather than using 'friend' as Julian I would express my 'regard' for such an individual.
Julian, I hold you in high regard.
I have regard for my fellow readers.