Friends make your life worthwhile. I´ve never had tons of them, but I had a couple of close friends in school up until I moved to Bucharest to study languages, 15 years ago. Quite on the sociable side, it has always been easy to find a person to chat with over a coffee or two. A close friend however is not something you stumble upon at any street corner. It took me in fact years of either trying too hard or giving up too easily on new friendships to find the right people. For ages, I used to think that I had no close friends anymore. That they somehow belonged to a closed chapter of my life and that the new ones were more or less acquaintances. People to have a beer and mingle at parties with. Somebody to invite over for dinner from time to time.

Two years ago I worked in Bergen for 3 months, so I would only come home in the weekends. It was a strange experience, a good one in many ways. I hardly had time for my husband, my pets and my closest friends and that´s when I discovered I did have some close friends, whom I really missed while away. Little by little I gave up on friendships that mostly stole my time and my focus away from things that matter.

I´ve been a little under the weather for the last couple  of days and I had to ask my friends for practical help. It was so difficult to ask and yet they offered their help without even blinking! Today things are starting to  look up. I came home to find a card from Paris sent by my best friend friend from high school. It´s amazing how the little things in life are the ones that count the most!

It just felt right to write down a couple of lines paying homage to friendship. Because it´s so precious. And because without it, you stand alone.