What type of friend are you?

A friend of mine said something today which made me think - she said she'd been deleting all the really unpleasant people she knows from her Facebook friends.

Well that begs so many questions, but mainly....  firstly if they are unpleasant why were you friends in the first place?   or maybe they were just 'acquaintance' friends, we all have some of those.  Secondly, are they really unpleasant or have they just said one thing you don't like?   Thirdly, isn't 'unpleasant friend' rather an oxymoron?

The verocity with which she said it shocked me rather, although it probably shouldn't (knowing the individual concerned).     I commented that I didn't think I had any really unpleasant friends, to which she replied that unfortunately she does.  This I must admit I took with rather a large pinch of salt as her friendships seem to run hot and cold all the time. Please excuse the mixed metaphors.

This is what I got when I searched Google Images for 'unpleasant friends'.  Hmm I guess they don't turn up with one of these in their pocket?

I can count the number of close friends I have on one hand - the ones I could turn to in a crisis.  Of course I have many more that number of casual friends and acquaintances but maybe I just don't get involved enough with them to find out if they are really unpleasant or not.  A bit like not finding out your partner's worst habits until you live with them.

The most I have to complain about is irritating friends - the ones who always seem to be negative, or mushy, or overly opinionated.  But that isn't the same as being unpleasant.

That then got me thinking about how much we attract different types of people as our friends. How much of whether they are 'pleasant' or not is to do with them, and how much is to do with what we expect of them which they don't or can't live up to?  Or, they expect things of us which we don't or can't live up to?  Either of those situations can cause bad feelings to build up, or just explode one day.

Or does what one person considers 'unpleasant' differ from another's?  Undoubtedly but I'd have thought we all agree if a person was generally nasty.

My final thought was that sometimes you have to keep certain friends slightly at arm's length. Get too enmeshed with them and you might find yourself saying the wrong thing one day, and being deleted because you're unpleasant.