Word of the Week

Friendship

Definition: the state of being a friend; association as friends

Consider this...

I was substitute teaching a Hebrew class the other day, and the students were reading a short story called, “Friendship.”

The students didn’t immediately recognize the word, friendship, in Hebrew, yet Hebrew crafts the word friendship in the same way that we do so in English. It begins with the word friend, and then adds a suffix. In English, we add, “-ship,” as in friendship, and in Hebrew, they add “-oot.”

I explained that this word, friendship is a noun that encapsulates the essence of the main word, friend. Similarly, we have words like relationship, mentorship, and comparable words.

Friendship is a very important part of life, whether we’re the kind of people who make tons of friends or just have a few.

I’m the latter. I have a few very intimate friends, who I love with all my heart. We live all over the country but meet up regularly, talk on the phone and online all the time, and would pretty much do anything for each other.

But something I’ve learned recently is that having great friends all over the place isn’t always enough. Having people to enjoy life with close to home is also important. Thus, I’ve been making an effort to foster relationships with other people recently and form more friendships.

As the Girl Scouts sing, “Make new friends but keep the old/One is silver and the other is gold.” Though I’m making an effort to mine some silver, I’m confident that, like a good alchemist, I will find myself with more gold later on.

Get inspired by Sue’s recommendations on ways to form new friendships.