Find your Bus-Buddy. . .

Well, what can I say - it has definitely been a while since my last blog: this is largely due to the fact that I didn't really have the time or the energy to conjure up some sort of witty, exciting story.
This is rather sad - I mean, what is the point of having a blog if you never write in it?

However, I have come to a sort of understanding with myself that I need to do this more frequently - it needs to become a habit. However, I want to start writing about what I think. Which I do alot. (contrary to popular belief)

So today, I decided to write about: friends. I have recently just finished a show that I was in at the Masque Theatre in Muizenberg called "Dance me a song" and one thing that was extremely apparent to me in this show was the closeness of my class and how we have grown over the 3 years (well, 2 and a half) as a group - we were actually discussing this last night over some "Sweet Chilli Chicken with Avo and Feta Pizza" at the Brass Bell in Kalk Bay. It is so interesting to see a group of people and how they evolve with one another over a course of time, how cliques tend to change and how some people will grow closer to one another than others.
I was never really accepted by the class from day 1 - I always felt like an outsider and "some people" played on this alot - not only insulting and teasing me a lot in behind my back, but in my face as well. This is something I don't altogether regret since there is a learning curve that was achieved by this.
By second year, things started getting a little better and I developed close friendships with quite a lot of classmates, but in particular one: my soulmate Natasha. And yes, there were people in the class who frowned upon our friendship as "too close" and that we were "losing sight of who we are without each other". But, thinking back on it now, I am convinced that the people in your life who really matter and whom you really care about become like an extra limb on your body - an undisputable part of your anatomy. (I guess this is why it is so painful when they hurt you - it's like someone has broken a part of who you have become). This is exactly why I can now confidently say: I don't want to know who I am without my best  friend.

Is that such a crime?

One thing that I want to make perfectly clear is that Tash is not the only one who has made this much of an impact in my life - CK, RP, TS, SES. You all know who you are - you are all appreciated beyond measure.
The one thing that I am most grateful for is that I have people on whose shoulder I can always cry on.
I was saying to Tash last night: "If I ever have children and someone asked me what I wished for them, I wouldn't say fame, fortune or even happiness for that matter. I would wish that they never have to feel alone in the world, that they would always have someone on whose back they can climb to carry them across the river."

Now, you might ask - why not "happiness"?
This is because of my firm belief that even our unhappy moments shape us into the people we become. Like Fynbos that needs to be burned down once every few years - it needs the destruction. Because without destruction nothing new can be created. And without change there can be no progress.

But, back to friends - I am extremely lucky and blessed to be surrounded by people who genuinely care about me and who genuinely love me for me. I know it's such a cliche, but you have not lived until you have found that one person with whom you can be yourself all the time and they are completely okay with that.
My friends share my joys, my fears, my happy moments, my sad moments and the moments when it feels like life is getting the better of me.

Ariel Dorfman, world-renowned writer, activist and public speaker recently spoke at the Annual Nelson Mandela Lecture at the University of the Witwatersrand. He said in his speech that a scientific study recently conducted found that babies kept in a hospital around other babies cried a lot more when they heard the cry of other babies - but when they recorded the baby's own cry and played it back to him/her - he stopped crying shortly afterwards. The scientists concluded that humans are born with a natural sense of compassion for other human beings and are more likely to share in the sadness of others than revel in their own.
Makes you think, doesn't it?

So, to conclude, I'd like to thank all my friends - who have stood by me through everything - all the hardships and the heartaches and even though most of you didn't like me at first - "It's not where you start, it's where you finish..." Not that I'm implying at all that I am finished with you - I love you all too much.

So my advice to those of you who haven't found that special someone: - like Oprah Winfrey said: "Lots of people want to ride with you in the limo, but what you want is someone who would take the bus with you when the limo breaks down."

Find your bus-buddy. It's so worth it.

P.S Natasha - this is for you. I love you beyond measure.

"There is one friend in the life of each of us who seems not a seperate person, however dear and beloved, but an expansion, an interpretation, of one's self, the very meaning of one's soul" - Edith Wharton