What I mean by easy, is, should a good friendship be something that just happens like if you don't see them for a while but when you finally do, it's like time stood still? Or, should one take a lot of hard work to maintain a friendship?
I'm just baffled with something that happened to me. I'll explain after I get some reviews about how you feel a friendship should be.
Thank you and warm thoughts,
Frustrated
If you have to "maintain" a friendship that is no friendship, in my opinion.
Think back to childhood, you didn't seek friends, they were just there. I'm 75 and still have a couple of friends that I have had since infants school. Sometimes we don't hear from each other for a year or two, but I know they are there, and it is a delight when we do meet.
Real friends get in touch if they haven't heard from you for quite a time. They are INTERESTED, they want to know what's happening.
This site is great - many new "friends" who are interested and help if and when they can.
Greetings from Constance
Hi Constance ~
I'm so happy you said what you said about "maintaining" a friendship. That's exactly how I feel This person that I thought of as a good friend, turned out to be so much work that it just wore me down. Needless to say, I don't communicate with her anymore. It's sad really, I've known her for 19 yrs or so. I have several friends that I've known since Elementary school, too and they are just like you described, always near to heart even if they aren't actually here and we pick up just where we left off when we meet up again!
Thank you so much for your response!
Warm regards,
Frustrated
Hi Frustrated
Yes I agree friends should never feel like they are hard work. I do belief that all friendships take some effort to maintain for example it would be unfair if you only waited for your friends to call but never call them.
I think it depends on how much you value a friendship as to how much you are willing to put up with. With this in mind I would consider they saying “You cannot make old friends”. Maybe you just need to pull away from this friend for a while. If they are truly an old friend, separation by time should calm the situation.
Hope this helps.
Regards
Gloria
Hi Frustraded,
Constance, Gloria and you have really said all that needs to be said on friendship. It's as easy as the air we breath and unlike a motor car needs no maintenance. Friends are there for mutual enjoyment daily, yearly, intermittantly.
There is one sort of friend you have not mentioned. It is the couple-friend. These are even more rare than friends, friends I say and not aquaitances. Yes the couple where each is a friend of my wife and I as a couple and each of us is a friend of the other two as a couple. That is the only difference. For the rest we can meet frequently or intermitently with extended gaps. We pick up with ease and pleasure. My wife and I have only had two such couple-friends in over 50 years. Sadly both couples have been broken by cancer. We do not expect to meet another couple-friend. We have had a generous supply of this rare friend.
Don't give up on "couple friends". As we get older it is perhaps more difficult to make friends. However, we have made several in the last 5 - 10 years. Of course time will tell
Hi frustrated,
A good subject, I get a lot of people on these forums that I have helped them to get various benefits, and what to expect in hosptals when having such tests done. So many say I am such a friendly person, and the way I have helped them was very clever and good.
I have had plenty asking to add them on Facebook - TBH, I think Facebook in itself is an over rated drama channel, you may as well watch a soap on TV! The sort of things you see on there are like 2 people they sit in the same roon and call each other names on Facebook, then others join in......that to me it is pointless, and broadcasting over the internet!
I have had many friends over the years, but as time moves on, friends have died - even school friends have been in major accidents, others have had diseases that killed them, others have committed suicide. Others have died of drug overdoses, alcohol poisoning, trafiic accidents, etc. Now, I do not know of a single person I used to go to school with, but I moved many years ago.
But, I am a person that is easy going and down to earth, I guess it's my personality - This may sound strange but I have friends, that I speak to that find me fascinating and say to their own friends that they know a guy who is very clever and knowledgeable perhaps you should meet him. They find me interesting and can talk to me about anything, and I can give them accurate information.
As for friends, and including the aforementioned I guess I make new friends easily, many ask to see me again or even ask me to join them for a drink, bear in mind I don't drink alcohol at all, which they understand.
I suppose in a way when people first meet me in a wheelchair, they cannot comprehend that I'm disabled but this is basically physically only and does stop me from doing many things. Mentally, and if I was not as many drugs as I am currently taking a day, people would understand that I do what every other person on the planet does, and that is increase what they know. I know some people have bad memories, I do get memory blocks myself - yet the information is still within me.
Because I am very clever with maths, I can take news articles, apply mathematic equations to them and then cross-reference data to come up with answers to ways that no one else has ever known. Some people I meet are mesmerized by what I can do. But I have to be literally in the right frame of mind.
I like George on these forums, he has been through a lot, like many of us - I find his articles interesting, and the same applies to Kath. Two people I look up to and class as very good friends on these forums and there are others but I find these two particulary interesting, more so because they are stateside, which is one place I have always wanted to visit - but this to me is just a dream.
Regards,
Les.
Hi Les ~
Well, I appreciate your response. I can see why people find you interesting, you are full of knowledge! I appreciate reading your posts because I know I will learn something from it. I can tell you are a very intelligent person.
As far as George, we've become friends and appreciate one another because of our understanding of each ones situation. And you, Les, I always look forward to you responding to an article I've posted just the same as I do George.
I am thankful for a few other's on this site as I consider them as good a friend as one can be. It's how one connects with the person that determines if it's a friendship or aquaintence.
Anyway, thank you for your kind words and to include me in your circle of friends on here. Yes, I am stateside and you and your wife are more than welcome to come visit if you ever get the chance. George, if you're reading this, you and Anne too! What a hoot that would be if we could all get together!
Right now a dream, who knows, later a reality? Perhaps 
Warm regards,
Frustrated
yes, O yes!
Thank you Les and Frustrated. Those are kind and warming words for me to wake up to on a cold and frosty morning. I will bask in their warmth for a long time. Mmm the six together. mmmm noisy, at least initially, I don't manage too well in noise.
To keep to the subject, friendships on the forum like friendships anywhere do not need maintenance. They run on delight and pleasure and understanding and confidence, minds comfortable with each other, somehow regognition rather than developed.
Hi George,
Yes I belief couple friends are the rarest of all and most precious. I have fond memories of past couple friends. It had been around 15 years since we have had friends where we get along well with both parties. I hope it is not to long before we meet another.
O no Constance, no question of giving up on couple-friends. If we are blest with a new couple-friends that will be wonderful, but at our age we have seen our two couples broken by death. That is a great misery of age. Tending to the survivors is quite different.
Dear Gloria, I do wish you the blessing of finding that you have a new couple-friends. I hope it will be soon.
It is a great tragery of life that one looses friends and loved ones when we are at our most vulnerable, i.e in old age. It certainly isn't easy when one is young, but one has the strength to deal with it a little better. (Or not!!!) However, common sense tells us that is the way of things and, as always, we cope.
Yes Constance, what else can we do but cope and feed on our memories.
Friends should lick and almost now when they need each others help. it like have a sixth sense and understanding of them
Not sure what my brains was doing there but finger weren't complying... Friends now each other well enough to know when to help and when to leave alone
Hi Jimmy ~
You're right, friends should know each other well enough to help or back off. Those who are always there for you and you there for them are true friends.
Thank you for your response.
Frustrated
Yes, Jimmy and Frustrated, when the herd is thronging the friend is quietly at the back, when the herd has gone the friend is still where the friend has always been, there for their friend.