LDKBox

I worked for a construction company for 15 years or so and made a lot of friends along the way.  I managed to cultivate friendships with the owner, office staff, and cohorts.  Somewhere along the way the company needed to expand and a partner was brought in to help the finance and engineering department of the expanding company.  It was a needed change for the company but it was unwelcomed by many of the minions inside the new company.  Including me.(insert sad face)  This new addition to the company was a certified engineer who had the personality of an elitist in-bred aristocrat.  He was rather snobbish to the foreman of the company and had complete disdain for the worker bee’s such as myself.  He was an a$$.  Not everybody’s able….?

One morning, years ago in Alaska,  as I was getting verbal instructions for the upcoming days work from my boss and owner of Exclusive Landscaping the construction company in Fairbanks, the elitist in-bred aristocrat entered the construction office smiling and made made reference to landscaping foreman Phil Petman.  The elitist in-bred aristocrat said very seriously, “You know Dan(Dan is the owner) I just left Little Phil.  I talked with him for five minutes and I have never felt better.  It is to bad I cannot put into pill form the feeling that I get after talking with Phil.  He is such a nice guy.   After talking with him you cannot walk away in a bad mood.”  I was dumbfounded.  Hmmm… the  in-bred aristocrat was saying something that I agreed with.  Phil is a very determined, hard working, and completely honorable human being.  He is a peer who should be emulated.  Not everybody’s able…?

As friends go I seemed to have accumulated an odd group.  Not odd in the sense that they are strange but leaning to the ecletic.  I have at least three friends from my industry over thirty years.   One friend in finance, others in education, tourism, business, the health field, military, and police work.   Most of these friendship were born though familiarity.  If you keep going back to the same place  you will eventually meet and like someone.  That is why friends are so special.  The commonality of familiarity makes for warm feelings that, if needed, can last a life time.   The early friendships of my youth give credence to my theory as do the friendships of my days of construction in Alaska.  The early friendships of my youth have been separated by distance, location, employment, and circumstance.  They remain intact for primarily one reason.  Trust.  Now my most recent friends are being tested the same way as the early friendships for they are in Alaska and I am in Texas.  As a construction worker one has a reputation to uphold.  It was never good to be considered wild with the equipment.  Working with humans on the ground with equipment that could and would crush or otherwise maim the ground person is a very serious occupation.  My friends in Alaska have that kind of trust in me.  As the friendships of my youth that are the most enduring have been separated by time and space so are the friends in Alaska experiencing the same dilemma.  Yet the friendships remain strong because of… “trust”…  Not everybody’s able…. ?

Lasting relationships don’t come by accident.  There is always a commonality.  Familiarity becomes a breeding ground for friendships.  Enduring friendships have trust.  Another condition for continuing friendship is “respect.”   This was brought to my attention by a longtime childhood friend, Ruth Johnson.  I had contacted her through the Internet and had asked if she might have a moment or twenty to discuss a situation of which her opinion would have import as to how I deal with a situation.  The conversation went well and she commented on how she appreciated the respect that I had paid her by asking if she would have time to discuss something.  I have always said the I would rather be lucky than good so in this case it was luck that I paid her repect since I knew that the topics to be discussed would be primarily about me this particular phone call so I knew(I guess this is where the respect comes in) that the person that I would be calling needs to be prepared to listen to my whining(Ruth later informed me that I did not whine…I was reticent to agree but finally acquiesced).  The call ended after more time than either one of us expected it to last.  Conversation flowed effortlessly with a comfort that only comes with true friendship.  Not everybody is able…?

Willingness is another factor for a friendship to remain.  Case in point is my recent lunch with Rex and Pam Rockhill from Fairfax.  Virginia.  Rex is a classmate of Ruth Johnson and myself.  He was in Texas visiting his daughter and son-in-law who live in Boerne, Texas during the school Christmas break.  Rex and I had hooked up on Facebook.  We then made tenative arrangements to meet for lunch.  I have to say that I was giddy with excitement.  It had been thirty plus years since their wedding day.  It was the same amount of years since I had seen either of them.  The willingness of Rex and Pam to take the time to come to Harker Heights is another example of  how a friendship can flourish.  Without their willingness I would not have the memory of our lunch together.  Not everybody’s able…!

More on the lunch and hopefully a picture of two in the days to come!!

Comments (0) Jan 08 2010