This past weekend, Simone and I, with the encouragement of our good friend (and pretty much adopted family member) Jeremy, did something we never thought we would ever do.
We did our very first Park Run.
For those not in the know, Park Runs are free, volunteer organized and run, events that happen everywhere in the world, typically on Saturdays. Visit their website to find out more and, who knows, maybe even register…
We first heard about this from our friend Podge in South Africa, who has also started doing them and also encouraged us to do one. When we told our Saffa friends about doing one, they, like Jeremy, were encouraging, wanting to know our time, asking how we did afterwards and when we spoke about our pretty average time of 42 minutes, were supportive and offered even more encouragement. Things like “By your third run, you’ll be able to get it down to 35 minutes” and other things that are nice to hear.
While sitting and having breakfast for me, and chocolate everything else for Simone and Jeremy, we decided to run a little social experiment. Because our South African friends (and Jeremy) were so supportive of what we saw as an accomplishment, we would see what our current social circle thought about it.
Yeah. Thats it.
It’s been two full days now, and still not one mention, not one well done, not even a question to show even the slightest bit of interest (feigned or genuine).
I wish I could say we were surprised, but we weren’t. I get it – everyone has other things going on in their lives, and somethings are a lot harder than running around a park at 8 AM on a Saturday morning.
Like a lot a lot.
But let’s be completely honest – how hard is it to say to your friends “well done”, “that was great” or even just “grats” like how we used to say in World of Warcraft when someone leveled up. It’s a simple acknowledgement of someone’s existence.
There is nothing really more to say. This is not supposed to call out anyone, or make others feel bad, or show people up on what a better friend I am. No, this is more an internal question. I think, I hope, I am a good friend. I hope I show people that I care with actions and words.
But if others don’t reciprocate, maybe that’s more a mirror to me and my behavior. Maybe I have been a bad friend?
And if that’s true, then I need to work on changing it.
