ON FRIENDSHIP COUCHES

Please think for a moment about moving a couch, trying to find a place in a house to put it. You and someone else are in charge of moving it as necessary. If both people are carrying it at about the same height, maneuvering it around corners and through doorways gets easier. Both people have the same goal - to move the couch - and it's easier to handle the situation.

If one person, however, lets their end of the couch droop, or worse, just drops it and walks away, one person is left holding the entire couch - probably with a sore back. Similarly, one person shouldn't be trying to lift the couch over their head if the other person isn't willing or able to raise it that high.

Obviously, the couch is a metaphor. In this case, a metaphor for friendship. Friendships, like any other relationships, take effort to maintain. Ideally, a friendship consists of equal effort on the parts of both parties. If one person is making all the effort to maintain the friendship - maybe they have the time or energy to do so - can it really be called a friendship? Because at that point, it's just one person dragging a couch across the floor, probably scuffing the hardwood floors, no less.

I look at the relationships in my life and realize that I make a lot of effort with a lot of people who aren't even trying to keep their end of the couch off the ground. The Mr. Brightside part of my personality says that they likely have other things to do; I understand this. Not everyone is capable of lifting a couch all the time, not everyone has the time to write emails and make phone calls as often as I do. But a minimum of effort is necessary to keep the couch moving, isn't it?

I admit that it's also possible that I'm trying to lift the couch over my head when the other person is just fine with it at waist-level. I'm an overcommunicator - am I also an "overcarer?" Do I care about others more than necessary? Do I need more validation than others that our friendship, in fact, exists?

A different side of my personality says that there's something positive about trying to lift a couch all by myself; that it makes me a stronger person, that there's something ennobling about this unconditional friendship, that it means I'm a good person if I keep making efforts when there's no reciprocity. Maybe it's the Christian part of my personality says that unconditional love is the way to go.

Maybe it's something in the middle. That if they aren't trying, then maybe the couch of friendship is good where it is, and we should leave it where it stops, throw a dust cover over it and move on. And while I hate dust covers, it's got to be easier than trying to continue to move these couches all on my own.

All this talk of couches makes me want to take a nap.