Theme
8:58pm November 28, 2014

Truth: What single quality do you most appreciate in a friend?

The desire, and ability, to work as hard as it takes to build a bridge between our minds. I no longer tolerate one-sided bridge building where I am the one doing all the work and they are nowhere to be found. As exemplified in Jim Sinclair’s poem:

I built a bridge
out of nowhere, across nothingness
and wondered if there would be something on the other side. 

I built a bridge
out of fog, across darkness
and wondered if there would be light on the other side. 

I built a bridge
out of despair,across oblivion 
and knew that there would be hope on the other side. 

I built a bridge 
out of helplessness, across chaos 
and trusted that there would be strength on the other side.

I built a bridge
out of hell, across terror

and it was a good bridge, a strong bridge, a beautiful bridge. 
It was a bridge I built myself,
with only my hands for tools, my obstinacy for supports,
my faith for spans, and my blood for rivets. 
I built a bridge, and crossed it. 

But there was no one there to meet me on the other side. 


That is a situation I will no longer tolerate. Bridge building goes two ways. For people very alike, it happens almost effortlessly, and that is beautiful (hi Anne!). For people very different, it can take years of work and that dedication is beautiful in its own right (hi Anna!). I wrote my own poem about bridge building gone completely right:

The Mind Bridge: A True Story. That link goes to my poetry blog. It depicts a deep friendship between two very unlike people, and how we built a bridge between us. 

The willingness to build bridges is necessary before I’ll become friends with someone. It doesn’t have to be explicitly recognized. It just has to be there. Otherwise I am stuck like Jim Sinclair, what xe describes as “dealing with people for whom nothing I can do is ever enough”. Whether the bridge building is easy or hard, instant or takes a decade, as long as it exists, that’s enough.