That's Mars Sanford, to be more specific, a filmmaker and animator here in Chicago. I know Mars because of this really interesting experience a couple of years ago, where his production company actually commissioned me out of the blue to write a half-comedy, half-drama screenplay for them, then invited me to actually sit in on the filming and editing process, just because they knew I was so interested in the subject and had never had that kind of opportunity before. (And if my archives were online at this point, I could point you to the entries I wrote back then about what it was all like - patience, dear reader, patience).

Anyway, me mentioning him the other day here made us realize that we hadn't actually hung out with each other in awhile, so he came over to my place last night and we just hung around shooting the shit and drinking, and eventually ending up at Holiday Uptown, a really fun slacker bar about two blocks from my apartment. Oh, and it was so much fun! I love just hanging out with Mars and not doing much in particular, because we always end up in such fascinating conversations - last night's, for example, went from such subjects as the thorniness of honeymooning in a legitimately poor country, to what exactly is wrong with the non-profit arts industry, to the creepy young-adult series "His Dark Materials" by Phillip Pullman, and just like another dozen subjects in between. And I finally got all caught up with Mars' recent wedding (at that wonderful antique gazebo-looking place on the south edge of the Lincoln Park Zoo - you know what I'm talking about), the latest with his schooling, his parents' health, and all kinds of other things I've been wanting to hear about in detail right now.

I think it's safe to say, in fact, that I treasure the time I get to spend with my friends anymore in a way that just didn't exist just a year or two ago - because the fact of the matter is that I've lost most of my personal friends over the last two years of my life, and literally only have a group of maybe four or five people left here in Chicago who are willing to get together with me in the first place anymore. And who can blame them, really? I've been a dick to a lot of my friends over the last two years of my life, as I myself have been wrestling with long-term unemployment, occasional depressive attacks, periods of complete withdrawl from society, unresolved issues concerning my ex-girlfriend that suddenly reared their ugly head two summers ago, much to my surprise. I didn't handle any of these things very well myself when they first appeared, and I certainly didn't make it easy for my friends to deal with me while I was going through them. And as a result, a lot of people I used to count as friends have finally thrown their hands up in the air over the last two years, and have said that enough is enough.

I mean, should we just put it in really simple terms? It's not easy to be my friend, and I'm well aware of that fact. I'm moody, and I'm fussy, and I'm constantly broke, and I manage to piss off strangers to the point of violence so easily that it sometimes makes my head spin. And even if someone is my friend, I will still call them on their bullshit just as quickly and just as loudly as I do to strangers here at my journal on a daily basis. It takes a certain personality type, I think, to deal with the constant bullshit which is Jason Pettus - someone extraordinarily patient, someone who knows how to not take on their friends' problems as their own. And in return, I expect a lot of things from people who hang out with me as well - I expect my friends to not be lazy with their thinking, to not be stupid, to not come to easy conclusions about either the world or themselves.

I've understood these things about myself for a long time now, and have understood that my adult life is destined to be one consisting of a lot of acquaintances and very few true friends. But in hindsight, I guess one of the things in the last year I've realized is how much I've just assumed those friends and acquaintances would always be there - that there will always be at least a certain amount of people in the world who find me interesting enough or entertaining enough to want to deal with all this bullshit, and to actually spend time with me on a regular basis.

It's been the last twelve months of my life that has changed my opinion about it all - where I basically got to a point where there was literally only one human being left in this entire city willing to get together with me on a regular basis (my friend Kate, to be specific), willing to put up with the endless stream of bullshit emanating from me like some black plague. It's made me realize that, no, in fact, I shouldn't assume that there will always be people around who are willing to deal with my bullshit - that just like every other human on the planet, I too always run a risk of becoming one of those crazy, bitter, friendless old men, who live in that dark house at the end of the street and never give the kids their frisbees back. And while it was funny at 25 to pronounce that I was sure of eventually becoming Old Man Pettus, the joke isn't nearly as delightful when you're 36 and suddenly really don't have any friends left.

So, I've been trying to change my behavior regarding my friends over the last six months or so of my life - to not take them for granted, to not blow them off when I said I would be somewhere, to treat them with the respect they should've always had, for being willing to deal with the endless amount of bullshit that one does when one chooses to be my friend. I've been trying over the last six months to rebuild these friendships again, to treat these people in a different way, to start out on the right foot with the new people I meet in my life anymore. Because, let's face it, having no friends sucks - it's lonely sometimes, and it's hurtful sometimes, and it just reminds you on a daily basis of just how much like shit you've been treating the people around you for so long.

So thanks again, Mars, for getting together with me last night and just shooting the shit about nothing in particular. It's more appreciated than I think you realize.