HumanityCritic's brief take on Friendships

One of the things that my dear father handed down to me, besides his expansive waist-line, a chrome plated 22, a penchant for violence, and a rather detestable habit of somehow making my cock the subject line of every story that escapes my lips, is the way in which he always seemed to keep his closest friends at arms length. No matter how long he knew someone, whether they roamed the mean streets of Sumter, South Carolina with him in the 1950's, if they served alongside him during his two tours in Vietnam, or if it was one of the many degenerates that frequented my father's auto repair shop just to "shoot the shit" so to speak, there always seemed like there was some sort of impenetrable wall that prevented my old man from completely embracing true friendships. Sure, he would laugh with many of these gentlemen over some Chivas Regal while discussing everything from cars, war stories, to the authenticity of Japanese pussy, but the checklist of these men's indiscretions that my father kept in his head was a thing of legend. Things like someone failing to return an automotive tool, someone trying to negotiate a repair bill that was already agreed upon, or a person drinking up all of his liquor without offering to buy any of their own - were all hell-worthy trespasses as far as my father was concerned, reprehensible acts that served as the scarlet letter on these men's chest that prevented my father from promoting them from acquaintance to true friend.

Now that I'm older I see that I'm the same way, sorta. Even though I've been known to keep people at arms length it wasn't because I didn't particularly embrace them as friends - despite my penchant for public drunkenness, love for reciting public enemy lyrics while having fellatio performed on me, and my habit of spewing all of my personal business on this blog like it was the proverbial handkerchief in this virtual porn theater that I call a life - believe it or not I'm an extremely private person. Maybe I'm an asshole, snobbishly selecting my friends like I was a doorman at "Studio 64" circa 1978, but I'd say that only 20% of the people who claim that they are my friends are actually correct about their status. I'm sorry, my standards when it comes having your back in a fight and taking one for the team - shamelessly distracting the fat friend of the girl you really want to get with by mistakenly fucking one of her fat creases during sex, are higher than crack feins on trampolines to be completely honest. Here are some of the traits that I feel a true friend should have..

The "Dead Hooker" Scenario: I don't particularly know where I heard it exactly, but I distinctly remember some actor once saying that his idea of a friend was a person whom you can call 4 in the morning with a dead hooker in your hotel room - with your friend immediately coming over with a six pack of beer and a shovel. That's what I'm talking about, a blind devotion where one person drops whatever the fuck they are doing to aid one of their fallen comrades. For example, a few years ago when I needed my friend's assistance in helping me dispose of a body as soon as humanly possible, my boy Buddy seemed to come to my aid before I even hung up the phone receiver. Granted, the body was the neighbor's dog that I had mistakenly ran over while returning home from my local watering hole, but the K-9's insides were splattered all over the street as if someone had just stomped on an extremely large jelly donut. Even though I could have just found a local Dumpster to dump the remains in, Buddy and I drove around with that dead dog in my backseat for miles looking for a place to bury it - like we were the new millennium version Joe Pesci and Ray Liotta in "Goodfellas" and shit. As the sun started to come up, the both of us still unable to find a burial spot - our clothes bloody and smelling like digested Alpo, we finally pulled over to the side of the highway and laid the deceased K-P on the side of the road - making the cause of death seem traffic related and not driveway related.(It felt like I had just shot somebody then proceeded to put the gun in their hand.) As I stood there feeling ashamed of what I had just done, staring off into space, Buddy interrupted my thought process by yelling "Hold it together man, its a fucking dog not an ex -girlfriend!! Join PETA tomorrow, Lets go!" Man, I miss Buddy.

The Silent Treatment: Maybe its because I'm monumentally lazy and only care about my own shit, but I always valued pure male friendships because of how long you can go without speaking to someone and still being their friend. When it comes to two women, if they somehow don't get the opportunity to talk for a few days it spells a rift of monumental proportions - a reprehensible act short of declaring nuclear war on someone or Oprah being cancelled. With guys it's different, I have gone a year without talking to somebody, and when we do finally chat it up - its as if no time has passed at all.

If you have beef, I've got beef: The great thing about your blog's archives is that you can go back in time, see where you have matured as a writer and as a person, and on those rare occasions be objective enough to openly admit the times in which you were a lying sack of cat crap. For example, in one post I stated that if one of my friends started a senseless altercation that I would shamelessly allow him to get his ass kicked. Maybe thats happened once or twice but all in all that's complete bullshit, there have been numerous occasions when I helped a friend pummel some poor bastard whose only goals for that night was getting shitfaced and being on the business end of some miscellaneous ass. Granted, when it's all over and the other man is badly beaten, his pockets empty from me aggressively taking his lunch money on some High School Bully shit - at the end of the night I'll tell my friend how wrong he was, if nothing but for future reference.