Friendship...

Over 30 years have passed since my early college days when I was attending what was then a small annex to the University of Puerto Rico in my home town of Arecibo. I had graduated from high school a year early by taking some of the necessary core classes during the previous summers, so as I began my higher education journey I had just turned 17 years of age, the same age my oldest son has today. My first few days at the university were filled with nervousness and insecurities that were all grounded on the fear that maybe I was taking too big of a bite for my first semester by having enrolled in a total of 21 semester hours. At the time, my eagerness to become a medical doctor filled my mind with goals that required me to basically become a professional student for at least 10 more years, so it just made sense to take as many classes as I could right from the get go in order to shave off a year or two if at all possible. By the time I was graduating from my associates in science two years down the road, I had already completed 80 semester hours and was well on my way to finishing pre-med. Like everything else that I have experienced in life, what I planned never really matched what I eventually achieved. My dreams of becoming a doctor soon got derailed into a completely new direction which led me to become an engineer instead. In retrospect, I find myself agreeing with an interesting line from the dialog of some of the characters from the movie "Across the Universe" in which when an argument arises between a father and son with respect to what the young man was planning to do with his life, eventually the most adequate answer reveals itself as the statement made by the main character of the movie. First the son argues that who you are should define what you do. Then an uncle intercedes in behalf of the angry father and says that what you do defines who you are. Eventually the visiting friend and main character of the movie is put on the spot to settle the argument and he wisely says something like..."surely it is not what you do that defines who you are, but rather how you do it." I tend to agree with that last statement.

On my recent visit to Puerto Rico during the Christmas holidays I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to reunite with some of the friends I had shared my life with during those early college days. The amazing technology of the Internet has once again found a way to bring into my life something that I needed and was missing. Getting in contact with one friend led into eventually making contact with many more, which soon enough made it possible for at least having a small reunion that was amazingly heartwarming and fun. Even though we only shared a few hours together during this last minute planned and accomplished re-encounter, I must say that it was the most wonderful experience I have had in a very long time. I feel as if I am cheating you with my words, since I believe that nothing I can say or write will be able to adequately describe what I felt for those few short hours together. It is like when you see a beautiful piece of art or a majestic landscape and find it impossible to put into words an adequate description of either one of them. Still I feel emotionally in debt to these individuals to at least try to reveal what they all mean to me.

A bit over 30 years ago one by one these individuals, together with a few more that were not able to attend our reunion, walked into my life in the simple act of college friends taking a lot of classes together. A little bit at a time we all became closer and closer to the point that a strong brotherhood evolved that basically turned us into a family. The typical youth emotions with respect to some becoming closer than others was present, however, overall the bond leveled itself out to be amazingly strong and evenhanded. As wild and crazy as some of our gatherings became, never did we lose track of the fact that we all wanted to succeed in our college endeavor, so endless hours of studying together brought us even closer. Some where better at certain subjects, making it advantageous to the others in order to obtain help understanding the difficulties of advanced math, chemistry, biology, and other subjects. The more we shared our lives, the closer we all became, and interestingly, the more we respected each other. One thing led to another and soon we were inseparable. The bond that glued our relationships had everything to do with respect and love, and not once did we stear away from those values.

In the middle of my second year of college, as I have previously posted, my father passed away at the young age of 44. One by one these friends found a way to fill in the gap of my devastating loss by caring for me, helping me get back on track in school, and mostly making me feel loved. During the recent reunion one of my dear friends attending quoted something I had said right after my father's funeral but had forgotten altogether..."many attended, but few where there." Meaning that even though the funeral was packed with people, only a few had made a difference to how I felt. I remember it clearly now, as one by one of my wonderful and loving friends walked into the funeral home, hugged me, and sat down on the floor next to each other and started to play the guitar and sing some soft and loving songs. The guitarist had lost his mother less than a year before, and in his heart he knew that there were absolutely no words that could be said to make the pain go away. Instead, he and the rest brought comfort into my heart by sharing their love with music and their devoted time, which was actually precious to all of them in the middle of mid-term exams. I confess that each and every one of these individuals are nothing less than my brothers and sisters. Even after so many years, to lose any of them would hurt as deep and as painful as it would be to lose a family member. In fact, while I caught up a little with each one of them, I heard about their lives, joys, successes, struggles, difficulties, and illnesses, and every one of them found a way to park themselves deep into my heart all over again. One thing that surprised me was the fact that after all of these years, some did not even have to speak for me to notice that they were in pain because of something difficult going on in their lives. They were not revealing in their physical expressions, not at all, since all we did was laugh, and sing, and share in between beautiful smiles and stories. However, once the bond was created years back, apparently it is not so simple to loosen up our emotional connections. Still, after so long I confess to love them just as much as I did back then, and even more.

My oldest son is now at the same age as I was then. I see him interacting with his friends and am able to understand him much better than he can possibly imagine. Friendship is a powerful drug that has incredible healing powers. I for one have enjoyed the benefits of being drunk with this elixir that life has given me with my loving friends. I hope that in there, between the wild moments of my son's life, he too can find what he needs from some of his friends to become whole. I am a witness to the benefits of having great people in my life, and no matter how far away we might all be from each other at any given time, it is what we have inside of our minds, hearts, and souls that lead us towards happiness and well being. To the great friends that have made an extraordinary difference in my life I say this...

"I have found in you something that is amazingly wonderful and beautiful. You have the power to refill me with so much of what I need to be happy. I want you to know that I have taken your heart and laid it next to my own so that they can comfort each other even when we are apart. Don't worry, they know what they are doing."

Dad