"Brandi, have you made any friends?"

Mahoney asked me this question literally 5 minutes ago and I thought it was quite funny.  This topic has been of some thought in this household the past few weeks.  I was advised by Mahoney that my parents and/or their friends do not count toward my friend tally, so the answer to that question is.....

No.

I haven't quite decided where I stand on the issue of making new friends here.  Sure, I'd like to have someone I can call up to go rollerblade down the St. Joe Walkway with me so that I don't end up on some crime show that starts out with "Brandi was last seen rollerblading alone on the St. Joe Walkway before her body was discovered in Graham Swamp several days later," but that's as involved as I care to get at the moment.  Roughly translated, I'm not willing to put for the effort that is necessary to build a meaningful relationship with a friend because I'm too absorbed in my own life to branch out.  Sounds horrible, doesn't it?

I came close to making a friend at Publix a few weeks ago.  She was a girl about my age, had a kid a little younger than Ryan and she worked there.  Ryan was the entire reason for a conversation to be initiated because he was being mischievous and she noticed he only had 1 shoe on (it was in the car).  We exchanged toddler stories, then brought up how she was from some other state (see? real good, I don't even remember where she was from lol), and how I had just moved from GA, and how neither she nor I had made any friends.  There was a brief pause and I said, "But it's kinda nice, right?" And she immediately piped in "Yeah, it really is--there's no drama!"  We had quite a banter going up until that point, but then we both went on our merry way and I haven't seen her since....of course, that could be because I haven't been back to THAT Publix, as there are like 6 within a 5 mile radius of where I live! 

To clarify something kinda big....if you're reading this blog and it's through my FB page, you're not who I'm talking about with regard to drama.  The real drama comes from "friends" that start out as friends and turn out to be jerks and linger in your lives past their expiration date.  All of those "friends" started out the same way--you meet, you like them, you want to hang out, find out they're too clingy/emotional/two-faced/backstabbing/shot out/etc. and it's too late--they've been to your house, they have your phone number, they're on your facebook and they've networked with your other friends.  They become this toxic presence in your life that you can't get rid of without things getting ugly.

I can give a very recent example of this phenomenon....my past little side job I had right after I left my probation job.  She was the spouse of Terry's coworker, she was raising money for a personal cause that I supported and contributed to, and her giving me the opportunity to make a little spending money gave me a little boost of confidence to leave my other job.  It started out GREAT (I know some of you are rolling your eyes since you witnessed the sickening FB banter of "Best Boss EVER!" and "Book a party!" and other such crap), but I liked her personality, we had fun together and talked alot, and I thought life was great.  I started to notice that I felt annoyed frequently after she would text me because she was just so demanding and such a know-it-all, but I tried to suppress it.  I thought she was nice and that her business could go somewhere.  No.  After a party I hosted where I had to pay the difference for people not showing up, purchasing 3 paintings that weren't worth near what I paid for them, and doing hours of free work, we had a falling out over a schedule conflict for Ryan's birthday party vs. her cousin's painting party.  She flipped her lid on me to where I quit, she begged me to stay, I slept on it, said I would stay, but knew I didn't mean it because I could no longer stand her.  She lingered on FB, sending me messages, getting her husband to interrogate Terry about personal details about our finances and what we were doing with the house, and so when we moved, I discretely deleted her.  And as of yesterday, she's still been trying to start crap by confronting me about defriending her.  I don't want that here!!

I have a wonderful circle of friends, they're just not HERE.  I feel like all of you have set a standard that will be pretty tough to meet, so I'm just content with leaving things the way they are for now and settling for weekend visits up there or down here.  Mahoney says I should go back to Publix and make friends with the girl.  I personally think it would come across a little weird.  "Hi, so.....you want to hang out sometime.... Publix girl?"  Yeah, no, that would not work.  Besides, I have some visits coming up in the next few weeks of some very important people that'll take my mind off of all that stuff :)