Friends, Good Friends--And Such Good Friends
FRIENDS, GOOD FRIENDS--and Such Good Friends
by Judith Viorst
WHAT TO LOOK FOR
Judith Viorst is an author of light verse, children's books, and magazine articles. In this essay, originally written for Redbook, Viorst explains what friendship is by describing different types of friends.
HELP WITH WORDS
Ingmar Bergman (paragraph 2): a contemporary Swedish filmmaker, known for his artistic productions
Albert Camus (paragraph 2): a twentieth-century French writer and philosopher
Ardor (paragraph 2): passion
Nonchalant (paragraph 8): without warmth or enthusiasm
Mutual (paragraph 8): join, shared
Endodontist (paragraph 14): a dentist who specialized in root canals
Crucial (paragraph 17): extremely important
Forge (paragraph 18): from
Dormant (paragraph 19): sleeping or inactive
Perspective (paragraph 20): point of view
Questing (paragraph 22): seeking
Calibrated (paragraph 29): measured
1 Women are friends, I once would have said, when they totally love and support and trust each other, and bare to each other the secrets of their should, and run--no questions asked--to help each other, and tell harsh truths to each other (no, you can't wear that dress unless you lose ten pounds first) when harsh truths must be told.
2 Women are friends, I once would have said, when they share the same affection for Ingmar Bergman, plus train rides, cats, warm rain, charades, Camus, and hate with equal ardor Newark and Brussels sprouts and Lawrence Welk and camping.
3 In other words, I once would have said that a friend is a friend all the way, but now I believe that's a narrow point of view. For the friendships I have and the friendships I see are conducted at many levels of intensity, serve many different functions, meet different needs and range from those as all-the-way as the friendship of the soul sisters mentioned above to that of the most nonchalant and casual playmates.
4 Consider these varieties...
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