All My Friends Are Fuck-Ups, But They're Fun To Have Around...

I've always had a fair bit of trouble making friends. This is because I can be considered something of an oddball. So when I did befriend people, they tended to be slightly off-centre themselves. High school was a time of particular difficulty; the first couple of years saw me bouncing around amongst all the usual adolescent suspects and never completely fitting in. And then one day, I found some people just as strange as me, and it felt like coming home. I wasn't especially academically gifted, I wasn't a sportsman, and I was too timid to even find out whether I'd be popular with the opposite sex (my guess: no). But my mates respected me, shared my interests and laughed at my jokes. What else did I need?

I prided myself on the fact that my friends were crazy: every single one of them. When I say that, I don't mean that we went nuts and jumped off buildings, or had parties that involved the police being called, or blew anything up. We were actually pretty tame in that regard. When we got together we saw local bands, went to the movies, got drunk at each others' houses and walked around the neighbourhood late at night. (On some of those walks we may have been half-naked, but that's as far as it went.) And that suits me fine, because I think an evening that doesn't end in you sitting in a police cell is a fine one indeed.

No, my friends were crazy in a quieter, but I think much more genuine way. We came up with our own language, which half the time we didn't understand. We danced as badly as we dared in public to make soon-to-be-forgotten local bands feel good. We invented insanely complex games; one of these we played at our school, which at first simply puzzled all our classmates until they decided they desperately wanted to learn how to play. In one of our finest moments, we created something approaching a philosophical movement based on the words "cake" and "non-cake". We were crazy because we pooled our collective imagination and didn't see why we had to keep it to ourselves.

The effect this had on me was huge. I started to come out of a shell I'd been living in all my life. I had an identity that was confirmed and encouraged by the people around me. And I somehow believed that it would last forever. It didn't occur to me that we were all teenagers, and that what seems fulfilling in a school environment is less exciting when you encounter the real world.

Long story short, I started to feel my friends were less cool than they once had been. I still liked them, enjoyed their company, recognised that, compared to a lot of people who really were the same as they'd been in high school, they were an incredible collection of personalities. But the odd sensibility I'd always identified with was being replaced with hobbies that I didn't share, worries that I didn't want to think about and concepts that - would you believe? - other people would understand. I felt like everyone had changed while I hadn't. And, as I've learned to my benefit, that is exactly what had happened.

My perspective altered last year, when I did something I'd pretty much promised myself I would never do: I grew up. Not entirely, mind you. I'm still something of an insecure man-boy. But for the last twelve or so months I, almost by accident, have been trying things I've never done before. I started taking chances. I met new people. I stepped out of my comfort zone - in some cases, way, way out. I got dissatisfied, which is not a first for me, but this time I started asking myself why and how I could change it. I made some mistakes. Some things happened that were really great, and some things happened that really sucked, and some of them were the same thing. And it was only when I thought about writing a blog about my friends and how they used to be that it dawned on me: "Oh, that's it. They all did this years ago. I've just caught up."

So what I'm saying, in a long-winded fashion, is that they're not the same people they used to be, and finally, neither am I. Whether or not the process ever truly ends, I don't know, but I'm sure it hasn't for me. I am, happily, still trying new things, and I'm most definitely still making mistakes. (A recent one landed me in hospital and looks like costing me quite a bit of money.) I'll always cherish the old days, and I'll always miss them too, but there's a trade off. I may no longer be able to spend an hour or two talking with my mates about "Sex: The Musical" (an idea I think still has merit), but next time I get broken hearted or fired or realise I don't know what I'm doing with my life, I know I have people to turn to. With all that in mind, I have a couple of messages to give out. To my old friends: I couldn't have coped without you then, and I doubt I would now. You always have in me, a friend, a confidant and an admirer. And you're still all fucking nuts as far as I'm concerned. To new friends and possible future friends: if ever I do or say something bizarre, or something that you'd expect from an adolescent, I hope this all explains it.

Here's to being a little bit strange, forever.