散文：什么叫朋友

A Faraway Friend is someone you grew up with or went to school with or lived in the same town as until one of you moved away. Without a Faraway Friend, you would never get any mail addressed in handwriting. A Faraway Friend calls late at night, invites you to her wedding, always says she is coming to visit but rarely shows up. An actual visit from a Faraway Friend is a cause for celebration and binges of all kinds.

遠方的朋友是這樣的一個人：和你從小一同長大的，或者是同學，或者和你原本住在同一個鎮(zhèn)上，后來你們中的一人搬到了別處。沒有一位遠方的朋友，你連一封手寫的信都收不到。遠方的朋友會半夜打來電話，邀請你去參加她的婚禮，她總是說要來看你，卻很少露面。要是真的來訪，那才叫“不亦樂乎”，各種名目的狂歡可就有了理由。

Faraway friends go through phases of intense communication, then maybe out of touch for many months. Either way, the connection is always there. A conversation with your Faraway Friend always helps to put your life in perspective: When you feel you’ve hit a dead end, come to a confusing fork in the road, or gotten lost in some cracker-box subdivision of your life, the advice of the Faraway Friend — who has the big picture, who is so well acquainted with the route that brought you to this place — is indispensable.

兩個遠方的朋友會經(jīng)歷密切交流的階段，接下來或許幾個月都不聯(lián)系。但無論聯(lián)系與否，友誼永遠不會改變。與遠方的朋友一席長談，總是有助于你更好地認識生活;當你覺得自己走入了死胡同時，當你面對岔路而不知所措時，來自遠方朋友的忠告就越發(fā)不可或缺，她看得清大局，完全了解你是怎么走到這一步的。