Did Clouds Get In The Way?

 

John Clark weighing in on friendship. When I was in my early teens, growing up on Sennebec Hill Farm, one of my favorite summer pastimes was leaning against a big pine tree in our blueberry field, listening to the wind make pine boughs sigh, while watching big puffy clouds change shape. One moment, there would be a dragon, a bit later it had become a hippo, then a castle before passing eastward toward Penobscot Bay.

Later in life, I started looking at human connections as a vibrant jigsaw puzzle where most pieces constantly changed. Those that linked up and remained connected were like good friendships. I’ll be perfectly honest, I’ve had few true friendships in my life, for varied reasons I won’t get into. Those that have endured I highly value as neither time nor distance can touch them. All of them have the same quality...that of elasticity, stretching and twisting during tough times, returning to their original shape when things smooth out.

When it comes to literary friendships. Sam and Frodo come to mind immediately. Imagine yourself and your best friend on such a quest. How would your friendship be at the end? Stand-alone YA fiction allows the writer a bit of wiggle room to create and bring friendships to some level of maturity. If done well, readers imagine themselves in similar relationships. If not, you’re likely to lose readers.

Series books are more challenging to relationships of all sorts. For an example of how they can be developed well, I point to the Harry Potter series. Everyone grew, despite endless twists and challenges. Fictional friendships between teens have certainly come a long way from Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, but then the challenges real life throws at them are a lot different as well.

What do your current friendships look like? What emotions come to mind when you think about friendships that fell by the wayside? I learned a long time ago that sometimes we simply outgrow other people and can look back with a sense of detached fondness and that’s perfectly okay.