Spending so much time with friends last weekend got me to thinking about them. One of the things love most about my closest friends is the comfort that comes from being understood.

What is something you love most about your friendships? Post a comment below…or send me an email and le0 me know ([email protected])

(you should probably stop reading here… the rest of this blog is deep into mcgill land, which is a crazy place.)

I’m a complex thinker, much more than most, I guess. It doesn’t mean I’m better, or it doesn’t even mean I’m smarter. It can become a place for pride to live, but every heart has this.

For most things, I tend to see lots of details. I also form lots of connections between all the things. Definitions are important (that is, interesting) for me. I love lines and boundaries: where one thing begins and ends and where another thing begins and ends is interesting. The essential qualities of a thing is interesting. This means the non-essential qualities of a thing are also interesting. I love to reduce and remove, and I love to combine and complexify (what is the verb for making something more complex? Build? Create? Make?) I love similarities and differences. When one thing changes into another, that’s interesting, the cause agent becomes another thing to consider. I love the black and the white, when the luxury of absolutes exist (which, of course they do in all the important things). When it doesn’t, I’m thrilled by the millions of grays that often come in between. I love balance and the tension between opposing and competing things. I love the frame of reference (or set of assumptions) that surround a situation or group of things. When you give that same situation or group of things adifferent frame of reference…you end up with something new entirely…

For me to understand a thing, it is not enough for me to know what it means in relation to me-does it help or harm-but what it means for anytime and for anywhere.

I’m sure none of this really makes sense to most people…that last paragraph may be the lamest thing I’ve ever written. But my closest friends seem to get this about me, and it’s a comfort.