What does "friendship" mean to you?

Friendship does not mean meeting up everyday; just like love does not equate daily phone calls and "I-love-you"s. It does not mean smiling even though you don't feel like it--or does it? It does not mean sharing thoughts, problems, trouble, consciously--it should be an au naturel process (and by stating this already I am defeating the whole idea of it). It does not mean calling each other every (other) day for the sake of calling each other up; for the sake of staying in touch.

Friendship is not a formula; and neither is Love. I have met countless who thought of both as a kind of formula--that to be a good friend, you meet up at least once a week for lunch; you call each other at least once a fortnight to "stay in touch"; you update each other about problems etc just because you are supposed to update each other--that to be a good couple (or for that matter for you to be any kind of couple at all), you have to send the girl home all the time simply because that's the way it's done; you have to remember anniversaries (monthly, bi-monthly, bi-quarterly, half-a-yearly, annually -whatever-) and celebrate and get presents simply because that's the way it's done; you call each other up every night to say "I miss you" and "good night" and "sweet dreams" simply because if you don't, you're not considered a couple; that you havta FEED each other because THAT's the way it's DONE; that you have to exchange "I Love You" every (other) day because that is the ULTIMATE symbol of your love and if you don't, well, that's simply Just.Not.Done.!

Well I am SICK TO DEATH of formulaes. You do something because it comes from your heart. Friendship is not about following these formulaes and if you deviate from these formulaes then, oh my god, are you my friend at all? Friendship is, cliché as it sounds, a process of growth; not a means to an END (and a pre-determined/pre-defined one at that!). The same is with Love. I once had this pseudo-relationship with a certain guy and he was the epitome of this Love-Formula concept. He was, to be crude, JUST going through the motions. Once, when we were doing lunch at Burger King and I was enjoying my hershey's pie, he stared (what he thought to be) dreamily into my eyes and my pie and smiled. I asked if he wanted some? And he shook his head. So okay, I went on with my pie. And after about five minutes, he ACTUALLY said, "You know, we're a couple right? Couples feed each other; you know, like that couple over there (he gestured to a couple at the other end of the room)." I got frustrated of trying to enlighten him to just BE himself that I just told him there and then that no, it's just doesn't work like that and so we're just not gonna work out.

Alright, so maybe where this "love" thing is concerned, these people are clueless and scared and this "love" thing is all foreign to them. They don't know what to do and how to proceed--they don't know how to Love, maybe--and so they follow these prescribed ways of loving. The same for friendships? People don't know what it is to be in a friendship? To be a friend? And thus they follow these prescribed forms of "friendships"?

I don't know. Seriously. Am I just not getting it, or am I just doing it all wrong? Is it me and fellow people who think like my school of thought; or is it the Other school of thought that is The Way? (Then again there's irony in that statement but I'll not deconstruct it and confuse everything.)

Like. Damn.