Yes. I, too, learned this the painful way. I had many friends, or so I thought. Then I got cut out of a volleyball friend group because I was too “intense” (aka

Yes. I, too, learned this the painful way. I had many friends, or so I thought. Then I got cut out of a volleyball friend group because I was too “intense” (aka talked about things that weren’t the weather) for them. Okay. That hurt a lot. Lots of thinking later, and I can now tell the difference between acquaintances and friends. There’s a simple test: acquaintances will be there when you want them to; friends will be there when you don’t want them to, but need them to anyway. An acquaintance would never do that.