What is a Friend?
What is a friend? It is a person with whom you dare to be yourself. Your soul can be naked with him or her.
They seem to ask of you to put on nothing, only to be what you are. They do not want you to be better or worse.
When you are with your friend, you feel as a prisoner feels who has been declared innocent. You do not have to be on your guard. You can say what you think, - so long as it is genuinely you.
Your friend understands those contradictions in your nature that lead others to misjudge you. with your friend you breathe freely. You can avow your little vanities and envies and hates and viciious sparks, your meannesses and absurdities and,- in opening them up to your friend, they are lost, dissolved on the white ocean of his or her loyalty. A Friend understands.
You do not have to be careful. You can abuse them, neglect them, tolerate them. Best of all, you can keep still with her or him.
It makes no matter. Your Friend like you- He or She is like fire that purges to the bone. They understand. They understand. You can weep with them, sin with them, laugh with them, pray with them.
Through it all - and underneath - your friend sees, knows and loves you. A friend? what is a friend? Just one, I repeat, with whom you dare to be yourself.
- C. Raymond Beran