Thinking Out Loud, Volume CCCXCV

They're totally different, but they work so well together that we rarely mention one without mentioning the other, practically in the same breath. Salt and pepper. Rice and gravy. Peanut butter and jelly. Possum and okra. Well, okay, scratch the last one, but you get the message. What do salt and pepper have in common? Not much. Do you ever have a hard time distinguishing the difference between rice and gravy? No way, yet we're so accustomed to seeing them together that when we think of one, we automatically think of the other. Can you think of people like that?  I'm not really talking about husbands and wives, but just good friends...people who've become so close down through the years that we think of them like we do salt and pepper.  I know a few people who are like that.  It's not that they aren't friends with other individuals, but there's a bond between the two that's so much stronger than it is with other people. I wish I could call it an unbreakable bond, but unfortunately, as I just witnessed, those bonds CAN BE broken, and it may not be an earthshaking event that causes it. This has been a typical conversation between some of my friends and me when we're working a trade show: "Where are we gonna eat tonight?" "It doesn't matter to me...I'll go with the concensus." "What are Ray and Elvin doing?" Or it may go something like this on set-up day: "I wonder where Ray and Elvin are." "I don't know. They're usually here by this time of day." Ray and Elvin are different personalities and they work for different companies, yet for years they have been such good friends that their names are like salt and pepper or peanut butter and jelly. It's been that way as long as I've known them.  Where one would go, the other went also. It's hard for us who have known them down through the years to say Ray's name without also saying "Elvin." They're both good guys, and have been best friends for many years...until two days ago. I witnessed the split.  This is an over-simplification, but Ray asked someone to do him a favor, which was granted, but the way it was done caused Elvin a slight inconvenience, and that made him mad. He blamed it on Ray, although if it had been done the way Ray asked, it would not have affected Elvin at all. Elvin verbally attacked Ray, catching him totally off guard, and it went downhill from there. I talked to Ray about it, and another friend talked to Elvin. Ray went even beyond the advice I gave him in trying to resolve the situation, but Elvin said he was done with Ray forever. (He also said some other things that I won't repeat.) I'm not sure why I'm even telling you about it, unless it's due to the fact that it upset me and I need to talk about it to someone...and I picked you. I really believe if it had been something major, they would've worked through it, yet they allowed a tiny, insignificant, unintentional event to destroy a lifelong friendship. I guess it's human nature to focus so intently on the mountain in front of us that we allow a molehill to trip us up, and that's sad. Close friends are among the most valuable possessions we have, and it should be unacceptable to allow those bonds to be broken by minutia. Peanut butter is just not the same without jelly. Preston