Social warranty

This is probably the stupidest exposition ever, but I don't care.

I am probably not the only person on the planet that sometimes feels exhausted trying to maintain friendships. I'm not even alluding to relationships, or chasing a potential date, just plain, regular, friendships.

Don't get me wrong; this is not a reflection on the quality my friends and I don't mean to belittle them. I think I've managed to meet and befriend a lot of truly wonderful people. But I'm also not as close as I could be to others just because it is more difficult to try to connect with them on a regular basis.

Sometimes, recently, I've felt like I've got too many things to do and just wouldn't mind just tuning out for a week or two. Admittedly, this is ironic, because it is a complete reversal. My having a "life" is reasonably recent - I used to rely a lot on the built in friendship of my ex-roommate for social interaction, and sometimes wonder despondently why friends didn't call more often. At some point, it occurred to me that, "Hey, dumbass, you don't call them, either." I haven't changed a lot; I'm not suddenly the centre of 100 social circles. But I do see some friends more regularly.

It just seems so much like work sometimes. When I get a day or 2 when I have no obligations, I feel relief at a chance to not be sociable and my motivation to do anything constructive goes right out the window - I revel in the opportunity to completely waste a day. I feel a little guilty, like I'm being rude to those people that I should have more time for, and that so much better use of my time could be found, even if it isn't social.

But, like most humans, whether they admit it or not, I am inherently selfish - we are trained to give a crap about other people, and develop strong relationships because we need the social support structure - we cannot make it without people we can trust and rely on to help us out, knowing that we'd drop everything in return if they needed it.

The social effort is worth it. I don't doubt it for an instant. But it just would be nice, occassionally, if there was a bumper-to-bumper warranty I could rely on, rather than having to performance the maintenance myself.