October 28
A Friend on the Other Side
A friend votes differently from us, and the disagreement follows us to the coffee pot. We are used to their support. Now their familiar warmth seems harder to receive because a part of us is still asking how they could have sided with the others. Nothing in the friendship was on the agenda, but it suddenly feels as though something was decided about us.
Affection and agreement get tangled easily. A friend may take our thinking seriously and still arrive somewhere else. Their vote may be an act of conscience rather than a measure of loyalty. We can be disappointed without asking them to repair the feeling by abandoning their view. Indeed, a friendship sturdy enough for independent judgment offers something valuable to both people. We need not settle the argument over coffee. We might simply remember the whole person standing there, whose life with us includes much more than this one decision.
What loyalty am I asking a friend to prove through agreement?
We have other things to talk about over coffee.
For the A.A. nerds: Twelve Concepts for World Service, Concept V; Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, Tradition Two.