Multiple times in the last half year, I've made plans and been interrupted by friends. Whole nights that I had planned to do other things ended up going by without actually doing what I'd planned--or actually anything productive.
And that's where I have to catch myself and say, "No, you're wrong."
I did do something productive. I spent time with whichever dear friend "interrupted" my plans. I may not have gotten work done. I (more likely) may not have gotten DVDs watched, games played, gotten laid...whatever I'd planned on.
Funny thing, though, now that I look at my thinking. I should have realised that I was thinking about things incorrectly from the start.
Almost three years back, I lost a dear, dear friend of about 15 years. The man was like a second father to me. In many ways, I was closer to him than I am my real father. We used to exchange emails almost every day for -years-. Not just small ones. We'd have back and forth conversations on anything from tape media, physics, politics, history, music, lots of computer administration and technological development topics (holographic storage, rosetta technology, etc.).
My friend is gone, now. He had a heart attack, survived that. Then he had cancer, beat that. He had complications from the cancer...more or less beat those. Apparently, the cancer was making a second visit, and his body was still weak from all the chemo and complications, and to hear his son (whom I also consider one of my dearest friends in his own right--and we still talk pretty regularly) say it, my friend's body just gave up--it couldn't survive another round.
My friend has been gone for almost three years now. There are days I see an article on some new technology he would have been fascinated by, and I miss him dearly, knowing he would have had some great counterpoint or insight to share with me on any given topic. There are days when I wish I could ask him a question, notably about storage media or audio recording (nobody I've known knew more about either--he was a recording engineer), and I am reminded of the hole he left in my life that nobody else can fill.
My friend and I didn't email as much as we used to in that last year since his cancer. He was able, but he was wrapped up in his own affairs. I was suffering really bad anxiety at the time, high stress, and I pretty much went into Recluse Mode[tm], and didn't initiate contact very often. I replied if contacted, but I wasn't going out of my way to initiate things on my own.
I'd do a lot to get that time back with my friend. That was wasted time.
There are days when my instant messenger goes off, as does my email. There are days when I'll say, "I'm going to shoot the next person that messages me! Go away!" to myself, just because I'm frazzled. There are times when it's inconvenient that friends decide "NOW" is a good time for a conversation. Sometimes I get sucked in and spend 1-4hrs just talking because I enjoy it. Sometimes I'm just there for them, because they need me to listen.
But it should never be considered an inconvenience when friends want to talk. You may not be doing what you'd planned, what you'd originally wanted, or what was convenient. What you are doing is spending time with another soul, who is your friend, and who is here for an indeterminate, yet guaranteed all too brief span.
You may be giving comfort, or you may be shooting the breeze and just catching up. But it is productive, and it is time well spent. You're reaching out to someone that matters to you, or you're there to be reached. In any event, you're sharing something with someone who won't always be there, and whom you will miss dearly once they're gone.
Learn to treasure those "interruptions" and changes of plan that bring you together with your friends. Inconvenient as they may seem, true friendship is not about convenience. True friendship is about being there, one way or another, whenever either of you needs it. And eventually it will be too late, and you won't have the pleasure and joy of being "interrupted".
Treasure your friends, and think about what's truly an important use of your time.
