There are all kinds of feel-good, fuzzy sentiments about friendship and loyalty but what does it all mean, really? Aside from our trusty canine friends, who else on earth can you be certain is actually, genuinely loyal to you?
I know loyalty. I’ve seen it. I’ve received it. I’ve given it. I’ve broken it, I’ve repaired it, I’ve demanded it, I’ve lost it and I’ve found it.
I could tell you stories all the live long day about loyalty and promise you it will be a huge thread running through my next book and because of such, I’ve been closely looking at the increasingly subjective term “loyalty.”
Not everyone will be loyal to you. Some you assume will, won’t. Especially women. We are catty, heartless bitches. I could give you a list of friends turned foes and their gross display of destroying the most basic definition of loyalty – but instead I’ll focus on some examples that have redefined the entire concept of loyalty and what it truly means.
First and of course, there’s family. I am the baby of four girls. Being my parent’s favorite has generated much chiding and jaw-flapping among my sisters and I, the oldest taking it the hardest because bless her heart, she IS the best! We are by nature a very competitive lot and have at times gone after each other with teeth bared and claws out. But still. They are my sisters. After all we’ve endured together up to this point in life, we’ve all finally learned how to fight fair. While we might throw cheap shots occasionally, most times a bi-annual long-winded but quickly forgiven puking of *“you-are-such-a-fucking-selfish-bitch-face-jack-ass-stupid-fuck-and-if-you-were-here-I’d-snatch-you-bald-headed-and-by-the-way-get-your-fucking-roots-done-you-lazy-ass!” And then we apologize, hug it out and not once in the tussle would we, or do we, or have we ever broken confidence or loyalty.
(*My eldest would never use the F word. Unless Obama won a second term. She’s Baptist AND Republican. Conversely, I’m the only of the sisters who doesn't require roots being done... yet.)
My sisters and I are a coven. We are exclusive and impossible to breach. I know secrets that would make your hair grow at hearing. And they know the most intimate details of me. My eldest witnessed me floating in a tub of monkey hair at my first attempt at lady-grooming and kindly told me “you missed a spot.” My second oldest had to check my bits while I was in labor last May, as I was certain it was not only gaping open, but my innards were falling out. Bless her for looking and reassuring me that no, it was all where it was supposed to be. My next-up sister will put all of her own strife and stress away, and does often, to listen to me blather the deets of me and mine. And then – and THEN! There’s our Mama. That woman is a vault. She’ll talk nasty about (and likely hex) people she’s never even met if they’ve crossed one of her girls, or our Daddy. Her aiding and abetting would put Karl Rove's best machinations to shame.
Not all family is like my immediate tribe. I’ve found sister-in-laws to be the worst kind of back-stabbing, word twisting, opportunistic traders, but… that’s another story.
On to friends. According to the 35,000 shrimp consumed at my wedding plus Facebook counting my “friends” at four-hundred-plus, I’ve got lots of friends. Tons. I’m just rolling in the friendships. Yet of all of those people, I can count on one hand how many of them I wholeheartedly trust in and believe that they are not only my friends and have my best interest at heart, but are fiercely loyal to me. Would squash and censure any negative talk about me by others. Would go East Dallas on anyone who hurt me. Would show up at any time of day or night that I needed them. Would and do keep my secrets, have and would protect me from harm and would never, ever betray or compromise our friendship. My most enduring, truly patient, generous in more ways possible to list here example is my soul sister, Alexis. She is the epitome of loyalty.
One hand. Minus a pinky finger.
And then there’s my man. My lovah. My baby-daddy, my partner in all things right, wrong, light, heavy, deep, shallow, trite and axis shifting. This man has been loyal to me since we were teenagers. Not to say we haven’t had our rows, splits, cracks and trials – who hasn’t? But we’ve walked through fire together and learned what true loyalty is, what it means, how to give it, how to never break it in any of the possible gathering, minute ways loyalty can be fractured over the course of such a long relationship. There was a toast given at our wedding that likend Rw and I to a pair of scissors – often moving in opposite directions, independently together and apart, but punishing anything that came between us. No one should know better how true that is that the man who said it. But that too, is another story.
So, what have I discovered? What is loyalty? Loyalty is telling your loyal-ee the truth even when it stings, and believing that the probable mad-storm over it will pass – and by God, you’ll be sitting there waiting when it does. It is having confidence to admit and apologize when you’ve fucked up. It’s not allowing the intervention of others to rock the foundation on which your relationship is built – be it by way of gossip, hearsay, assumption – listening or participating. It’s sticking up for your people, ferociously. It’s protecting their good name when someone tries to sully it. It comes without ultimatums – it is something that’s either innate to the relationship, or not.
It’s not keeping blackmail pictures of your baby sister’s grooming-gone-wrong. It’s the sister who knows exactly where you are when no one else on the face of the earth does. It’s the one who drives through a tornado in spite of her irrational fear of lightening and eighteen wheelers to be there simply because you said “I need you.” It’s an automatic ear on the phone from 287 miles away the second you’ve finished a chapter, and every morning since college. It’s kindly shutting haters down at restaurants in Galveston, or on back patios. It’s when your blood pressure rises at the mere thought of one of yours being wronged.
I’ve danced many jigs with people that in no way fit my found definition of loyalty, even recently. It’s been those, the one’s who’ve taken and expected loyalty without the reciprocation of it that have hammered home the importance of it, the requirement of it, the necessity and realization of just how rare loyalty is. What a gift it is to receive it.
For me, loyalty is Richie Wayne, Marmie, Poppy, Kellie, Amy, Cissy, Alexis, Carrie, Tina, Suzanne and my children.
Loyalty is born of and bred from true affinity, real love and honest connection. It might be unspoken but is still and same a tangible, breathing thing.
Loyalty is trust's spine. And I've got one hell of a backbone.
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