What is a friend?

 

-Bernard…Bernard…

In the silence and the darkness of the night their whispers woke me up.

-Bernard Bernard…                                                                                                             

 It was a tough night, full of thoughts but I got up, look around and see in the corner of my bedroom a few people. Who are these people? What do they want? I approach them very slowly, tying to wake up completely.  I am now, very near them, they all have open eyes staring at me, their face still hazy, they repeat hissing…

-Bernard…Bernard

-What …what?

-Bernard…Bernard

-Yes, yes. It is me.

-Listen, listen.  you wanted to know more about your friends, you are thinking of them very often and wonder if you always did the right things.   So, here we came to talk to you.                                                                                                                                        

They must be 6 or seven young people, I think I know who they are because looking at them brings me memories, but unclear memories, just some images not well defined.  Some of them smile, some look concerned.                                                     

One come closer to me and say: 

-You have to believe and trust all the stories and experiences we had in common, do you remember? We gave you what we had all the time, we gave you enough to make you live and even dream and be in the arts, and then you believed in us and in our adventurous life…You were thinking that we can live with just smiling at every new day …You were full of dreams and inventions, you were always ready for any possible new adventure, you were so interested in every aspect of life! You were creative and full of new ideas, you were special.

 I am trembling facing these words, but he goes on:                                                             -Now it seems it is over. What happened to you? Where is the man we knew? Did you change your attitude? Did you change your ways of thinking? Did you change all together? Know that your friends are still here to guide you, to help you, to give you confidence.

 I look at him and words escape me:                                                                                    -You mean I still have friends? Me? I have friends?

 They are now 3 of them talking together:                                                                             -Yes you do… You see dear friend, we did not forget anything, you were part of our life, part of our thoughts, part of our dreams…And you became part of us forever…And we are still here for you. 

Remember: You were not worried about the end of the month and what will be the next chapter of your life, you knew there will be one and you were ready to deal with it…                               

You were not worried about the impossible dream of big success, you just wanted to go to the movies and dream that you were one of the heroes or at least one of the actors…                                                                                                 

Please believe your friends: you still have great days to come, take advantage of them, good years go fast but bad years even faster, they only build your strength…There is no end for dreams and achievements, go for it…                                                                      

I hear my self-saying:                                                                                               - What is life about???

Now all of them answer:                                                                                                       -We go thru earthquakes and volcano’s eruptions and hurricanes, we have many experiences of love found and lost, but friends should still be there, and we should never be broken despite some terrible events in our life. Life goes so fast, so many experiences, so many great moments, so many pains and joys, so many wonderful encounters...And for many of us many questions about the meaning of who we really are and what we do... but friends are still there.                                                                                                                                                        

-Yes, yes... Friends are there.

They all say together:                                                                                                           -Yes, we become older, but listen to your friends and go on with building another life with our help. Listen, you have to hope for a perpetual new life, and we will build it with you. We all go through many difficult moments, but we have to stay always strong enough to dominate them, to stay above it, even to use them to become a full person. It is the best way to find some peace, to find some balance, to BE…   We need always to reinvent ourselves in order to survive and have moments of happiness or joy, we cannot become bitter. And when you are attacked and destroyed by the world, when you are even denied proving yourself, when you become the prey of vultures waiting with joy for your disappearance, real friends will appear near you and hold your hands, and talk to you, and you will again be you with their help.

Suddenly, their faces become very clear. And I could see David, Robert, Joel, Kay, Alfredo, Mark, Roger, Ann, and too many others……They come closer to me and hug me and give me kisses on both cheeks… They are now next to me, my friends who disappeared so suddenly from my life, my friends I miss so much, my friends who are in my heart every day…                

Death and love together... what a mixture!

They all started to fly with big smiles and disappeared…Yes, my very dear friends are gone forever from my life, but they have given me so much, I earned from them about existence, real thinking, love, forgiveness, dedication to my profession, and how to give myself… Thank you for being in my life, thank you for your words, it makes my soul more peaceful.                                    

We have ALWAYS to try to be there for the people we call friends, what does that really mean? When can we call somebody a friend?                                                                                              

 I think I know what friendship means thanks to the ones I made the past 50 years, and I am trying to continue to be a friend to them…Caring for them, helping them when they need me, always being around for them sharing their joy and their moments of happiness and caring for the people they love.             

And when life separates us and put big distances between us, I have to stay in touch to know about their last achievements or their last failure or disappointment… Making them understand that they are not alone, I am and will always be there for them.    

Too often, almost every day, life puts us away from the duties we have to the people we call friends, and we go into the terrible mood of ignoring their existence. We cannot do that, let us stop to be selfish, friends need us, need to know we are near them in spirit and ready for action to help them…                                      

How can we call somebody a friend if we never try to connect with him/her.

Unfortunately, in this new world it seems that the more we go the least I know… 

Sometimes I am lost in this new way of functioning, this new way of THINKING, and very often I do not know what to do for friends.                                                         

This new world is a challenge for many of us, we have been living an eternity in other ways of thinking..                                                                                                 

But we have to accept and to recognize that the world and society are in perpetual movement, and it should be our duty to adapt to the new rules.                                                                                                                                                                                 

We have to keep present in us, all the time, the notion of what it is to be a friend, to care for some people, to be there for them and today try to follow the new rules and the imposed obligations.

I have been lucky enough to be in theater, to live again and again incredible strong moments, to purge my soul, my body, my mind, my fears of deeply buried devastating emotions. I loved the theater because it is almost the only time where I could be myself with no shame, no barriers, no calculation no selfish intentions.

Now the theater is gone from my life and sometimes it is frightening to know that I will wake up in a new world.           But can we really always live in a fantasy? How can I deal with the demands of the ones who believe I am the same person that the days before?                                                                              My friends know, my friends care about my thoughts and my feelings as much as I care about them

And my friends who are now in another dimension still protect me because they are present in my mind and feelings

forever.