Random thought dump! There's a couple of vague, sensitive topics brushed on but nothing very intense, as a heads up.

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When I was young, it was so easy to make friends. Keeping them? That was the kicker. Between moving frequently, and various emotional issues budding from a drastically changing home environment, the worst came out of me, oftentimes onto those friends that I'd made. Anger, proneness to violence, dependency, jealousy, trust issues, communication issues, so on so forth.

Early on in high school came avoidance and the tendency to fade out of any friendship I made in fear of loss. That was when making friends became so much harder. The unwillingness to try and reach out, all the while being consumed by loneliness.

Self inflicted. Self infected with a virus of doubt worming into my mind.

I was lucky, and some kind souls reached out to me one day at lunch. I tried to avoid them as I'd learned to do, but they persisted in their kindness. So I stayed. The first real friends I'd had in a couple of years, I was elated.

I didn't want to lose them, not again. So, I taught myself how to be better, and teach myself not how to -make- friends with them, but rather how I could keep them.

The anger was still there, of course.
The violence, still there.
The dependency, still there.
The jealousy, still there.
The trust issues, there.
The communication issues, there.

It was all there. What was different this time, was that I wanted to try. Really and truly. What was different was that I refused to let those worse traits of mine hurt the ones I love. I pushed myself to work on communicating the bad feelings, to try to fix things. To trust and open up. To not make my personal issues their issues, but to not refuse when they choose to carry some of the burden. I didn't seek to impress or entertain to make them like me, but provided support to their interests and spent time with them.

Through these efforts, I was rewarded with only a few, but amazing, friends.

That's not to say I haven't messed up at times. I've trusted too much in some, depended too much on others, snapped and lost my temper on a few more, etc. Some have disappeared, some left, some drifted away to do bigger and better things. That's okay.

Making friends is hard nowadays, but keeping the few that I have is worth all the effort in the world. I've been friends with my high school friends for over 7 years. My college friend for 4, and my oldest online friends for almost 4 as well. They are not many, but they mean the world to me. They saw me through my worst, and taught me and allowed me to grow.

Because of them, I strive to do my best and be a 'keeper', haha. 

Thank you to those who are my friend, you know who you are ❤️