Over a dozen years ago I had a best friend named Phillip. We both worked for the same company and when we first met we could not stand each other. Our boss was making us work together on things and over time we found out we had a lot of things in common and for the next 3 years Phillip was my best friend. Whenever I needed someone to talk to he was there and vice versa plus we would go bowling together about once a week and we both enjoyed SciFi shows like Star Trek.
During this time I had left my job and started my own company. Phillip and I had made a mutual agreement that if he became interested in a lady that worked for me he would not pursue a relationship with her as this might cause future problems Several years later Phillip did become interested in a lady that worked for me and Phillip took me aside and asked for permission to date this lady. This caused a huge argument between Phillip and I and our friendship almost completely disappeared because of this.
About a year later I has some legal problems where I could have really used a friend to talk to every once and awhile and Phillip was nowhere to be found. I tried to initiate our friendship about 10 years later but the things we once had in common were no longer there and Phillip had a new wife and was very much into his religion.
When I was growing up there was this one kid Tony who was my best friend. We both loved baseball, the movies Raiders of the Lost Ark, Flash Gordon, and Grease. He had gotten a computer back in 1976 and he taught me how to program it using Basic. He could do so much with that computer and I had always figured that someday he would make a lot of money creating computer applications. After high school we had both gone in separate directions. I did not see him again until our 10 year reunion.
Tony was now one of those phone operators working for AT&T plus he was married and this lady was to put it as nice as possible very homely looking. I had 2 businesses back then, a retail computer store and a wholesale computer business. I was on top of the world at that reunion because both businesses were doing phenomenal. Tony and I stayed in touch via chat after the reunion and a couple of years later AT&T was laying him off. I always thought that he should have gone into computers because he was so good at it but he was only looking for another job like the one at AT&T.
I had an extra computer at my house and I thought that if I sent it to Tony along with a programming package like Visual Studio that maybe it would motivate him to pursue something in computers. I didn't even say anything to Tony and I just sent it after gift wrapping it. Ironically it was real close to Xmas when I did this. I asked for nothing in return from Tony but it would have been nice if he had maybe said Thank You.
When he got everything the next week instead of just saying thanks he complained about all the accessories he now needed to get. He also stated that he preferred Intel CPU's as opposed to the ones by AMD. He never opened the Visual Studio but instead sold it for a few hundred dollars. It's now been about 4 years and I never hear from Tony any more. I haven't even gone back to my hometown to visit in the last dozen years.
Several months ago at Booksamillion there was this lady that would serve me coffee at Joe Muggs. After several visits we started talking and I went out of my way to help this lady out along with her husband and kids. Just little things like creating a website for their part time business and I helped them with some minor research on the net. I had figured that maybe they would become friends with myself and my wife. In the end all this family was maybe interested in was just becoming casual with me and my wife.
Currently I have taken a part time job outside the house because I figured I would meet other people plus have some extra money. I am the oldest employee that this place has, everybody else is in their twenties or even younger. I have tried to maintain contact with my half brothers but I am part of my Dad's old family and very seldom do I even hear from my Father. I am not an alcoholic but I thought about joining a local Alcoholics Anonymous just so I could be amongst other people who might even eventually become a friend.
Over the many years of my life I have always tried to help others like other business people or people I have just met somewhere . For some reason none of these others are ever interested in maintaining a friendship. With everything that my wife and I have going in our lives we don't have the time or the money to join things like a bowling league and neither of us drink so we will not be going out to any clubs.
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