Not at all
Is this me saving the best for last?

Maybe.

One of the nicest things that's ever been done for me is someone just, well, being there. For I've no idea how long (we try to work it out and I always forget) someone has just always been there. At the end of the phone, always with money for beers, petrol in the car to take me to the middle of nowhere to look at the stars when the world gets too much, and tea in the pot. Not to mention the mercy missions when I couldn't leave the house alone and needed food (or more likely, cat food). A man for whom little is too much trouble, who always has a ready smile or laugh, who gives me perspective when I am tied up in knots over some spiralling paranoid moment, and who responds to pretty much every question starting with ,'Are you sure I'm not asking too much...' with his steady, 'Not at all'.

This friend has saved me more times than he'll ever know. He's taught me that people can be kind and genuine and honest and caring just because that's what friends do. Coming from a place where I was convinced the only value I had to anyone was as something to fuck, this lesson could not have been achieved by any amount of counselling. The day to day of just being there is proof positive that friendship is real.

He's a private person, so I won't list all that he's done. There'd not be space anyway. But I want him to know that, as I always used to say before I realised true friendship doesn't come with strings or conditions, I am so glad he's my friend. I'll not name him but I know he's on here. And I hope he knows this is for him.

Thank you for being there, for accepting me as me. You're the greatest friend anyone could wish for.

EDIT - I've just read a phrase that sums this person up.

'....where we give without thought of what will be given back...

Proper friendship. I love it.
( ancrenne doesn't eat anything that can play video games, Thu 9 Oct 2008, 12:13, closed)

aww click
Luckily I am blessed with a very small group of properly wonderful friends, the types who will pick you up when down, listen to my drunken maudlin whinings and give me a kick up the arse if and when needed, and it is all reciprocated, we look out for each other and are always on the end of a phone / waiting at the pub with a round already in for each other.

Its taken a few years but at the moment everything is nice.

Not very exciting, but nice, it all builds to that slow and gradual attempt to live a mellow easy, and mainly nice life free from too much stress.
(Killing in the name of Halfy keeps changing things, Thu 9 Oct 2008, 12:40, closed)