“We’re born alone, we live alone, and we die alone. Only through our love and friendships can we create the illusion for the moment, that we’re not alone”~ Orson Welles

Who are your real friends?

One way to find out who your real friends are is to have a real life-changing event and see who sticks by you. I don’t mean a job change or even a death in the family. Anyone can sweet talk you through that. I mean, who can you call at 2 a.m. and know they will answer your call?

Over the past few years, I reinvented myself. I can count on my one hand the friends who are still with me. Those few are like gems in my hand. It is a feeling, a closeness in my soul that differentiates that friend I will call in the middle of the night and those I won’t call until a decent hour after sunrise. My 2 a.m. friends, I can count them on a few fingers. What is the difference between 2 a.m. friends and non 2 a.m. friends?

I can’t define it but I can tell you what it looks like in real life.

A 2 a.m. friend is forever loyal. Even when I have had all I want of life and I want to crawl in a hole, a 2 a.m. friend will not let me give up. They might crawl in the hole with me for a little bit, but they will reach in and pull me out kicking and screaming. I can say “I hate you” and they know I don’t mean it. They still love me anyway. They tell me what I need to hear when I need to hear it even if it hurts my feelings. They will not let me do anything stupid, at least not alone. A 2 a.m. friend will never abandon me.

With a 2 a.m. friend I can joke in a way I can’t with other friends. Our conversations often begin or end with casual insults and no one gets mad about it. This friend I am comfortable enough at their place to raid the refrigerator and complain about there being nothing to eat. When we talk it is about everything and nothing. I can tell them exactly how I feel and they don’t patronize me or belittle my feelings. A 2 a.m friend keeps my secrets, cries with me, and is there when I need them no questions asked.

We may live and die alone physically but we are more than simply physical creatures, our souls need other souls to connect to. The French philosopher-priest Pierre Teilard de Chardin expresses it far more eloquently than I;

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience”.

Believe in being and having a 2 a.m. friend.

~Lori O’Gara