This will be quick. I'm almost done with writing feedback to students on their exploratory writing for their final essays. Those are their beginnings to what become their drafts and finally end up as their polished essays. And I run across this:
Farouq is a true friend in my eyes. A true friend is somebody that you can give a hard time, and then in return can be given a hard time without any hard feelings. A friend will do anything it takes to support the other.
She's writing about a friend of the protagonist in the novel we recently finished. Maybe she's just stating the obvious. I'm not sure. But for some reason, I feel as if I've rediscovered some vital truth just now reading it. Maybe "anything it takes" is too open-ended of a claim. But a true friend will do a whole lot - that's for sure. She's referring to a situation in which the protagonist has announced that he'll do something that is dangerous, even potentially deadly, for him. The endeavor is more dangerous for him because of he can't walk upright. But he won't back down. So this friend allows him to go through with it by carrying him - a dangerous, difficult action in itself for them both, but far more possible than if the main character attempted it on his own. At the same time, these two are so blunt with each other throughout the novel that the protagonist takes a long time to even recognize them as real friends. Yet maybe that truth-telling is in itself part of doing "anything it takes."
I'm thinking about how hard it can be to find the right balance of honesty, humor, care, treating someone with dignity.... What sometimes gets lost when I don't talk with people enough is that ability to joke with each other and know that it comes across the way we both mean it. Or to tell truths that aren't meant to hurt. And to know that you are known well enough that your own truths about yourself won't be completely misconstrued. That ease, that sublime comfort can get blocked by awkwardness, misinterpretations, and unintended hurt. Sadly, both people may actually have great senses of humor and mean well toward one another, but there's not enough light to see it. Everything can become so heavy.
That character, though, is completely immersed in the day to day life of 'his people.' (The book is literally called Animal's People.) Even then, trusting others takes him a long time. I wrote a paper last fall semester about this novel. I'll post it up here in case anyone's interested in reading it. Trust is a crucial part of it - how we have to trust even when we don't trust. That's the only way through, I think.
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