"Tell me who your friend is and I will tell you who you are"

Hello everybody! I'm back! I finally finished my last final/day of Spring quarter this last Thursday so I now have about two weeks of down time, which is so nice! I'm getting lots of sleep, finally cleaning my apartment, and relaxing with some good movies. I feel so free right now and I finally am feeling like I have time to spend with friends again, which is a little harder to do when I'm in school. I am going to take classes this summer, but I think it will be okay, especially if I can stick to the homework schedule I am planning on coming up with for myself, finally learning my lesson after 3 quarters of really bad time/homework management. I went to FHE tonight at a rock sculpture garden. We didn't have any big activity or anything, but we got to eat veggies and cheese and crackers and just walk around a garden a look at funky statues and just enjoy the summer air. I love summer! It's getting warm and it is lovely and happy.
I've been thinking a lot about friendship lately. I have two friends right now that are having a bit of a hard time. One is dealing with, shall we say (without going into detail online), some sad and challenging news, and both are kind of in a transition time of their lives, trying to figure some things out about their futures and make some decisions, which we all know can be very difficult and daunting at times. The first friend was having a particularly hard time this last weekend, and really needed some company, and I had the chance to be there for her and spend quite a bit of time with her, which I hope helped. It's amazing how perfect the timing was too. I'm not saying that it was good that she got her "news", it was quite sad actually, but what I'm saying is that when she really needed me, I was able to be there for her and actually had the time to spend with her, which had not been the case just two days earlier because I was still finishing up school. I'm happy to have been available to be there for her and help her get through the hard time she's having.
The other friend is just having some hard life decisions to make right now, as well as a few other things, and is just having a bit of a hard time. Well I saw this friend tonight and I asked her how she was, cause she just seemed like she wasn't her usual cheerful self. We got to talking and ended up talking for quite awhile about what was going on and how things are going in our lives. I don't know if I helped at all, but I think it was at least nice to just be able to talk some things through, and once again, I'm glad that I had the chance to be a friend to her and be able to listen to her and what she's going through right now, quite a bit of which I could actually relate to. She told me some things tonight that she said that she would only feel comfortable telling certain people, and I have to say that I took that as a compliment. I took that to mean that she considered me to be less of a casual friend and more of the kind of friend she felt like she could really confide in about things that are important to her. Don't worry, I'm not trying to puff myself up here, I'm just saying that this is what I felt like when she said that and it made me feel good that I could be that kind of friend to her.
I feel good when I have friends that I can confide in and vice versa, and when I can have a chance to be a good friend to my friends. I think true friends are people that are there for you when you need someone. A true friend is kind and compassionate and willing to serve. Friends are people that care about you and want to help you to be a better person. They want you to be the best you can be. It's important to look for friends who can be like this for you, and it is possibly even more important to be this kind of friend. The other night I came across this video (that has to do with friendship) while browsing around www.lds.org and I just really liked it and I think you should go watch it :)