What is a real friend?

      A challenge I've run into throughout my school and work life is conditional friends. No matter how close you become to a classmate or workmate, once you or they move on to a different school or job, the friendship evaporates. Evaporates quickly.

     The buddies I had in college were guys and girls I knew almost from day one. We lived together in the same hallways and rooms. We partied in our rooms (almost every night!). We hit the party scene/the bong 'n kegs almost every weekend. We knew each other's friends. We knew each other's families. We knew each other’s classes and coursework and favorite games.

     The day we graduated was, for most of them, the very last day I ever set eyes on them. Just like that. No fancy goodbye. No emails going forward. No nothing.

     And even the friends you "keep," are friends in a different way. You may see them once a week or month or year or every few years. But it's not the same level of every day friendship. This even happens with family members: my own sister, I'm sad to recognize, who used to be with me every day, play the same games when we were little kids, go on family trips together .... when we see each other once or twice a year now, it's almost like a formal greeting. That's all. I've always found that sad. 

     Which leads me to reflect on what a real friend is. It's not only any friendship of dedication and time. It's a friend who maintains a level of friendship that is valuable for both of you, despite whatever life changes happen. That level may change - will change - over time. But it remains of value to both of you. No matter if you change schools or have kids or move to Tanzania or buy a Tesla or become a Cleveland Browns fan. You remain friends. 

     A real friend is special. Hold onto him or her. 

What if we are small and alone?

     In the ongoing internal debate between theism and atheism, a thought that bothers me is a sense of emptiness. Without a sense of a god (or gods) above, where do we place ourselves in existence? Existence which, we've more and more become aware of, is enormously enormous. Both in time and space. Even if the universe is not infinite, it is so incredibly large that our place in it (our entire galaxy's place in it!) is so amazingly small that we - as individuals, as groups, as countries, as a whole world of people and other lifeforms, is so incredibly small and - yes, I say it on a cosmic scale - insignificant.

     We go through such SHORT lifespans relative to the ages of our planet; dinosaurs occupied the earth for about 165 million years .... the first life on earth was about 3.7 billion years ago .... earth itself is about 4.5 billion years old .... the first humans came onto earth's scene about 5-7 million years ago. The time we (as humanity as a whole) has existed is almost as miniscule as the physical place of our planet in the universe.

     How does this make us feel about our lives? What we do in our lives? Who we know and interact with? If there is no god? If we just live and die - and when we die, that's it. No afterlife, no nothing. 

     If this sense of the relative emptiness of our existence, this crucially short and precious existence, was felt more strongly by humanity now and in the past, how would our conduct to ourselves and to our fellow-humans and fellow lifeforms be different? If we had no sense of a god above or going to heaven (or hell). How would it be different?

    If we all had a feeling of our shared ephemeral existence .... would we fail to care for each other so often? Would we fight with each other so often? Would we wage war on each other? Would we cheat each other? Would we hate each other? Would we be more compassionate toward those less fortunate than us if we believed there was no god that would save them at the end?

     Or would we (I like to opine Yes!) love each other more? Would we avoid hurting each other if we all felt that our existence was so short and miniscule in the scale of the cosmos? Would we be so adamant about making money and beating each other out of jobs and sports teams and occupying Alsace-Lorraine? 

     I do feel that if we all felt we didn't have a god to forgive our sins, to take us after death to an "eternal paradise," to forgive and love us .... if we felt it was just our brief existence together on this miniscule, physical earth .... we would be more of a community. A whole-world community that cares for and helps each other through our meager existence.