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In my life, I learned the hard way about keeping very few, close friends. I suffered through an embarrassing, four years of high school because I tried to make every person I met my friend. I knew the first names of over 400 different students. Probably, half of those students I knew told rumors about me that still hurt even to this today. I had the same lack of trust issues in college. Being a black student from a small, mostly white town, I didn't fit well with urban teenagers from Harlem and Chicago. Back in the early 1990s, black males dating white women just started. In Lamoni, it was frowned upon a lot. And my being a virgin didn't help matters. Just because I never said a woman in my bed every other night, my behavior was rumored to be gay. I never understood why someone who didn't have sex would all of the sudden want to screw men.

Aren't friends supposed to be there for you? If so, how is that so many end up being "back-biters" and "traitors"? One word S-E-X is why. Men and women are competing every day for the affections of another. When two people are dating, there isn't an one-on-one relationship anymore. You have to deal with their nosy friends. They have to deal with your nosy friends. Nosy friends are wanting to know everything from how much your date has, how good they're treating you and how good they are sexually. Nosy friends are like tabloid reporters. If they can't get the real story, creating fiction is just as fun.

Friends who are "butinskis" don't serve any good purpose. How can you trust someone if they're running around spilling your secrets? I finally lost my virginity with a college administrator. She was 41 at the time (April 1993). She wore a dark, brown tan. She was tall, blonde and very curvy. I was a college senior. We'd go over to her house and hang out. I made sure to meet her off campus property. To respect her privacy and save from disciplinary action, I never revealed our time together. My "friends" still spread rumors about me being homosexual. They taunted me with their ugly and loose women; including several high school-age girls who hung around the dormitory. What was funny, the girls were playing the so-called "playas". Whatever money they got my college mates, the women gave to their "thuggish" men around their neighborhoods.

I'm lucky to have one best friend. Our bond stretched for 13 years. We shared so many secrets between us. She never "nosed" around into my affairs. We respected each other's privacy. However, we confided with each other about anything. Nosy friends aren't friends at all. I removed myself from the fake friends I had in high school. I quit trying to be a "people pleaser". I grew comfortable being by myself. I grew comfortable in having only one best friend I counted on. I don't tell every person I meet any personal business. In my past, my loose lips sank my battleship. At this time, I'm sailing smoothly on quiet waters.

Learn more about this author, Marcus Brooks.
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