Friendship

We were sitting at a table together and I was watching the two of you about to bite each others head off over some statutory interpretation exercise. I couldn’t help but to be a little amused. Meanwhile I was buried in my reading for another paper, secretly grateful I’m spared from the heated debate. At one point, one of you said something like ‘That is an absurd argument, it is so stupid, I’m going to write a doctoral thesis about why you are wrong’. And the disagreement kept escalating, before it had to be cut short because of a looming lecture on Tikanga Maori.

Then a few minutes later in the lecture room, I hear you guys cracking jokes and bursting into laughter about the very things you were arguing so viciously about. I grinned at the transformation. ‘What a pleasant and refreshing example of friendship’ I thought.

I was so happy to see this today. It uplifted my mood. I can imagine you guys, five, ten years down the road, as you navigate through law school, embarking on your careers, through the ups and downs of life. What you guys displayed was so special. You can fight, you can disagree, and then the very next moment you can have a laugh. You come back to each other acknowledging that you’d like to spend time with each other. Not always with a purpose. The great thing about friendship is the gratuitousness of it! We don’t need each other but we’d like each other and enjoy each other because .. well, because being together is fun!

What a privilege gratuitous fun is. We should seek it and cherish it more.