While smoking shisha last night, my friend Khadijah and I got into one of our always hilarious and insane conversations. This one relating to the reasons why we are friends.
Neither of us could find any valid or logical reasons why we have this friendship since we have very little in common.
We don't share the same taste is fashion,movies, music, food or men. We have very different religious orientations and cultural upbringings. Nothing that would justify this bond we share.
To amuse ourselves we started listing all the wacky things we could come up with such as the fact that we both have natural hair and we can both read. Lol, there were many other things listed bordering on the ridiculous. We had ourselves some good laughs.
The reality however is that we are very different people and yet we are friends and have what I think, is an amazing friendship.
It made me think about all my other friendships, the ones that have lasted the longest and I realize that I have very little in common with these people as well.
I mean the on-the-surface type things that usually draw people to each other. Like the common affinity for cottage cheese or Tupac or some other arbitrary thing.
What I have come to realize though is that at the core of these friendships is an openness on both ends to accept each other for who we are; to truly accept the differences that make us unique.
There exists a mutual respect that is crucial for the development and maintenance of the friendship. You embrace the differences and in time similarities will develop as the friendship begins to grow.
For me these are the relationships that have withstood the test of time and distance.
