Falling in love with your best friend

There are some who say it’s impossible to do that. They say once you’ve relegated someone to the Friend Zone, there’s no turning back.

I beg to differ.

Chris Rock said “When you’re meeting someone for the first time, you’re not meeting them, you’re meeting their representative.” I think that’s the most difficult part of beginning a new relationship, breaking through the outward façade and getting to know the real person.

Often once we’ve done that we don’t like what we find, but since we’ve already invested so much time and emotion in the other person, we’ll try to make things work with them anyway so that it doesn’t all go to waste, or out of fear of having to go through the whole process again – rather the devil you know that the devil you don’t.

I think this is symptomatic of our modern lifestyle. In the days of yore, our ancestors lived in small, close-knit communities: tribes and small villages.

Meeting a mate was a much simpler task in those days. You had a very limited number of possible candidates, and those candidates were already well-known to you. You had grown up together, you’d known each other your entire lives.

Post-industrial urbanized society has had profound impact on that part of our lives. Living in cities with millions of other people, most of whom we will never meet, is an unnatural state for social apes such as ourselves. It has necessitated the formulation of some new mating behaviour, specifically dating.

Although dating is necessary, it’s a flawed procedure, since many people end up in long term relationships with people with whom they are not really compatible.

But for those of us who are fortunate enough to experience it, there is an alternative.

When you’re friends with someone, you get to know them without the added pressure of trying to make a relationship work… it’s just a reciprocal sharing of thoughts, ideas, experiences and company, the sole goal of which is its own enjoyment. You often meet without the added burden of having to make a first impression, so you get to know the other person better from the start.

If you’re friends long enough, you get to see the other person reacting to a number of different situations, including relevant ones like being happy in a relationship, being unhappy in a relationship, and heartbreak.

Sometimes, if you’re very lucky, that friendship can develop into something even deeper and more meaningful: you can fall in love.

When you fall in love with a friend, the awkwardness is already out of the way. The “honeymoon period” is so much sweeter because there are far fewer nasty surprises.

One of the main misgivings people have about transforming an existing friendship into a romantic relationship is that there is more at stake: if the relationship fails, the friendship will probably be lost as well. The risk is a real one, but considering that the relationship was built on a far firmer foundation than most to begin with, the odds of that happening are diminished. In fact, it’s probably a safer option – the stakes are higher, but the risk is considerably lower.

As you know, I’ve recently fallen in love with one of my best friends. I often thought about what it might be like if it were to happen, and I always knew it would be awesome, but I had no idea how truly amazing it would be.

Since we’ve already shared so much, we have a pretty good idea of what makes the other tick. This gives us the added advantage of being able to anticipate each other’s insecurities and misgivings, and to address them before they become issues.

We also have a working knowledge of each other’s history, tastes, passions, philosophical and religious points of view, families, friends, careers, and, in our case, lifestyle. Having that knowledge upfront has facilitated a far more comfortable and natural-feeling transition, allowing us the opportunity to forgo the awkward first stages of dating and get right on with the good stuff.

Some critics might say that trying to get something going with your friend is taking the low road, the easy way out. Yes, I think it can be easier, but that doesn’t make it bad. On the contrary, what’s the problem with falling in love with someone you already know and care for? I think that fact makes it better and more real, not the other way around.

It’s still early days, and I’m still on “probation”. But I think that if I make it through the trial period, I will be able to make a significant contribution to her life - beyond what I would have been able to give as just her friend - and I will do my utmost to bring her as much joy as she does me.

Kansas falls in the war against ID

Pharyngula::Goodbye, Kansas

A commentary on the MSNBC article reporting the Kansas School Board's 6-4 vote in favour of teaching Intelligent Design in science class.

Today is a sad day indeed.

Is it any wonder that Popular Science rated "Kansas Science Teacher" as number 3 in it's 2005 Worst Jobs in Science survey.

Dilbert.com - Weasel Awards

Dilbert.com - Weasel Awards

Take a look under "Weaseliest Behaviour".

Hellkom.co.za

Hellkom.co.za - Encouraging Affordable Communications in South Africa

For my international readers, in SA we currently only have one fixed-line telecoms provider: Telkom - a major corporation partially owned by the government.

I knew they were screwing us over when it came to broadband pricing, but I didn't realise it was this bad. It's cheaper to fly to Hong Kong to download 100GB at an Internet Cafe than it is to use a home ADSL line in Joburg!

To Boldly Go

Decipher - The Art of Great Games

Decipher has started revealing the cards from it's new Star Trek CCG expansion set To Boldy Go.

From what I've seen there are a few amongst them that frighten me:

Up the ante



A one-card win or lose scenario. This will certainly spice things up. I'm curious as to whether this will count as a Full Win or a Modified Win.

Agonizing Encounter



Considering that my deck relies heavily on skill redundancy for the sake of bonus points, this is a potentially very dangerous Dilemma.

All my opponent need do is name the skill 'Leadership' or 'Security' and they stop four Personnel right off the bat. That's usually enough to cripple a Mission attempt, even with my crew of Androids on board.

Ouch.

I'm hoping this set will feature an Escape-like Interrupt for preventing the stopping of any number of personnel. I'm on the edge of my seat.

Curses!

Jean Grey Phoenix HeroClix

I was so proud of myself for having organised a Dark Pheonix figure, and then they go and release a Jean Grey "Mega Pheonix" figure using the same sculpt and similar stats!

Bastards!

Granted, it's still a limited edition, but still!

Behe's 15th-century science

Behe's 15th-century science - York Daily Record

I really enjoyed this. Excellent read.

Bloggers Unite! (Two in particular)

Something quite remarkable has happened.

I have come to see one of my closest friends in a whole new light... instead of being "just" a friend, my friendship with Hide has expanded to include the romantic as well.

It all feels so natural, simple and comfortable. I'm very excited about the path that lies before both of us.

So wish us well as we embark on this: a truly amazing, rather risky, but potentially extremely rewarding journey moving the friendship to higher levels of intimacy.

Dinosaur comics

A relevant one

Tom Cruise is nuts

I so want to see him vs Rayden. Or even better... Tom Cruise vs the Powerpuff Girls!