A while back, I was asked to attend a certain function that I simply could not commit to. I was sure to tell everyone involved that it was questionable at best, whether or not I'd be able to attend and made it perfectly clear for no one to expect me at said function. Now you would think that this level of honesty would be respected by your friends and even though they may express regret about your absence, true friends should understand and not continually pressure you into coming anyway.
...or so this was my mindset until the night before the function. One of my friends ended up getting really drunk at home and continually exerted pressure for me to attend. The guy actually kept harassing me via the phone while I was at work none the less. Needless to say, I finally caved under the pressure and had to alter other plans just to appease this guy. Quite honestly to this day I'm still out of sorts about the whole thing.
I realize my tale may seem like a little thing but when you measure it against the fact that my other plans had me not spending time with my child as well, you start to get some measure of how weighty the situation actually is. The fact that I couldn't spend time with my child due to pressure from a "so called" friend has definitely put a damper on our friendship and may ultimately lead to it's dissolution.
Now I know what your thinking, man is Duke ever a tigh@ss and I'd be crazy if I didn't see some truth in that statement. The thing with me is that if you continually push the envelope (as this guy does), eventually I'm going to keep you at an arms length. Once I've distanced myself from an ongoing uncomfortable situation I have no intention of allowing history to repeat itself. I've been guilty of being a over trusting schmuck on more than one occasion and it's cost me dearly several times.
In my honest opinion, life is too short to continually compromise your principles if all it does is bring you discomfort. For this reason I choose to surround myself with a smaller number of truly good people that I feel I can trust. To me a true friend is someone who may not always agree with you but who does try to see your POV and respect your decisions.
...anyone less is unworthy.