Never Take the Things You Have For Granted

“Many people will walk in and out of your life, but only true friends will leave footprints in your heart.” –Anonymous. This is an expression that I have heard many times and I strongly believe in. In my experiences with my ex best friend, Corey, I wish he never took the things he had for granted. He is a very smart, talented, and articulate person, who couldn’t see it the way that I did. Even though we are no longer friends the way we used to be, the things I did to help him will be embedded in his heart. He is now in a state of regret because he realizes now that he had every thing he needed to succeed, but now he has to work harder and struggle more because he gave up too easily and decided to go down a path of living for the moment and not for the future.

Corey and I have been best friends for over three years. I first met Corey when he enrolled back into high school at Blackstone Academy after his first time dropping out of Shea. We became best friends within the first three months of our meeting. We told each other every thing. I told him my deepest darkest secrets that I wouldn’t tell anyone that I didn’t trust, and I don’t really trust anyone. We were always with each other, and he was more than a best friend to me. He was very protective, supportive, and always there when I needed a shoulder to cry on or someone to talk to. My relationship with Corey was different than most of the many friends I had, it was very unique.

For a few months, he was coming to school everyday but then he started slacking off. Problems started arising within his family and he started to feel the way he used to feel when he first dropped out. He became lazy, started thinking that school wasn’t for him and that he could just go down the easy path and get his G.E.D. He thought that would make his life easier, but that’s where he thought wrong. Things in his life just got worse. We started fading away from each other slowly. He completely stopped coming to school until it came to the point that he dropped out again for the second time. I can’t count how many times I tried to convince him that dropping out was not the answer, and that it really wasn’t a good idea. He had all the support he could ever have from everybody in the school, especially from me. I even tried going to his house everyday in the morning just to help him get out of bed to get to school. I reminded him I would always be there for him if he needed help with his school work or portfolio. I wanted to see him further himself so that he can have a better life for his mom and, most important, himself.

As things got worse, we started getting into arguments all the time over the most stupid disagreements. One day we got into a fight where we both felt physically and emotionally hurt, and it resulted in us not talking to each other at all. It was the week of his birthday and then mine, we talked about all the different things we were going to do. My birthday was on Sunday and I waited all day for a phone call from Corey. I waited and waited and I never got that call. I thought to myself, if every body else who I am not as cool with can call me to say happy birthday, then how come the one and only person who I can trust with my life in their hands not call me at all, ever since that Friday of May I never talked to Corey. I would go to his house to go pick up Dre and see my other friends and he wouldn’t say anything. I would walk in his house like it was nothing and not even talk to him. He never made the effort to call the next day or even call me from someone else’s phone to say “Hey, my phone isn’t working but I’m calling you just to say happy birthday talk to you later.” Since that day Corey and I don’t speak at all.

I lost someone in my life that was very important to me. I always went 50 percent of the way for him, sometimes even more. However, there is only so much that I can do for him that he has to learn to do on his own. I put so much effort, care, time, and love into Corey that I know deep down inside he feels he has lost someone that was very loyal and supportive to him. Now he realizes that he had every thing there right in front of him and he fucked up. Many times I do feel affected by our friendship not being the same because he was a person who filled the void in my life. Now that he’s gone the emptiness is back and I learned not to get close to people the way Corey and I was because of the pain I went through because of him. Sometimes I feel that I should be the bigger person and make an effort to call or talk to him, but then again I’ve done so much that it doesn’t really make a difference to me. Some people might think that were not talking over some childish fight but I always called no matter what, I always made the effort to call and say “Hey I’m sorry for fighting with you.” But now it just seems that once you give someone all you got they just don’t realize how much you really do care. I guess it is true, you never know what you have until you lose it.