My parents once told me, and then again, to make friends with the right sort of people. I do. I really do. I always do because I believe in the saying that goes, “Who your friends are is who you are,” and by that said, I make sure that I go with people. The right kind of people.
But sometimes, we cannot let go of the sort who we like to be with, especially if we share the same likes on things, hobbies, or ideas. This thought came from a video I saw online (on YouTube to be very specific), about having a friend who is, well, high-maintenance.
That one high-maintenance friend
Here’s the story: I grew up in a neighborhood where kids play outside. My friends and I enjoyed playing under the rain. We loved laying on pavements or shower on rainwater from the roof gutters where bird poop dried up for staying there for a very long time. We were just kids.
As I grew up and got acquainted with strangers-turned-friends, my experience changed. Probably my behavior has changed. But I still love the old things I used to do when I was young: shower on rainwater from the roof gutters.
Now, there’s always this one friend, not mine, but similar to this: who would rush home because the yaya is already yelling at him. The middle-aged woman was familiar. She was the one who always followed the friend to wipe his face from sweat or from the dirt. Yes, the very señorito, he is.
As we grow older, we still meet people like “this one friend”. All the time. I will try to enumerate some experiences in the past that would tell you that I have high-maintenance friends, too.
1) A friend who doesn’t want to eat street food
Don’t attempt to even tell them to have at least one small bite. We, Filipinos, love our street food: chicken feet, isaw, batikulon, pig blood’s soup, and the champion of them all–balut–with vinegar and a dash of salt.
It might be because they cannot stomach these stuff or they have bad experiences with them. But why? They are delicious. Well, they are not that clean, clean, but they won’t kill, aren’t they?
2) A friend who always bring a pack of tissue to wipe his shoes
Come on now. You walk with your shoes. They suppose to get dirty. What do you want? Float in the air? Or fly perhaps?
This is true to me when a friend of mine was so anxious about his shoes getting dirty and we spent a lot of time looking for a convenience store to buy tissue paper. Good lord. But thank you there’s a 7-Eleven nearby.
3) A friend who sprays cologne all over his body before going to buy something at the convenience store
I know he wanted to be presentable or something, but we won’t take long. I just need to get a cold drink or buy something to nibble while doing stuff at work. We will be back in the office even before you blink.
Please, can you hurry up?
There are other things I wanted to share, but I guess this blog post will be longer and it will take me time to finish everything.
Friends can be funny as well. I love my friends whoever they are… whatever kind they are. But can you please be not so high maintained?
“Yaya, can you wipe my back? I feel so sweaty.” Oh boy!
Do you have friends like that, too? Do you have funny experiences with a high-maintenance friend? Or worst, canceled a dinner plan because the group wanted to eat at Jollibee but that one friend preferred somewhere else fancy?
Share your stories in the comment section below. Let’s see if I can recall having that same experience.
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