Literary Inspiration: George Santayana on Friendship

One's friends are that part of the human race with which one can be human.

-George Santayana

Over the last couple of weeks I've been lucky to have the opportunity to finally connect in real-life with some of the wonderful people I've met through this blog.While in Christchurch I had the pleasure of meeting up with Andrea of A Cat of Impossible Colour. I was a bit nervous as she was the first person I'd ever met through our mutual bloggy friendship. I had no need to be, we talked widely about a whole bunch of mutual topics (including how, if pressed, we would slaugher our own meat! LOL) as we sipped away on our iced frappes. We also talked about the general disappearance of Miss Karen from around the blogosphere - if you're out there honey, drop me or Andrea a line so we know you're okay! She also gave me Monsieur Petit, whom some of you may from his previous appearance on her blog.
I took him to Akaroa, the only place in New Zealand settled by the French. About an hour outside of Christchurch, I was in Francophile heaven! Monsieur Petit has his own photo album on my Facebook profile and I can't agree more with the following comment:
Akaroa is totally his spiritual home. "I ride zee tiny Hector's Dolphins and taunt zee Blue Penguins while eating a croissant! Hong hong hong." That's the closest I can get to describing French-sounding laughter).Monsieur Petit also came with me to meet Alice, one of my dear readers from Tasmania! She happened to be holidaying in Auckland so me and Monsieur caught the train in to meet her and drunk our take-out coffees on the waterfront. It was really lovely and a nice way to relax after work.
It's amazing how quickly we can become friendly with our fellow blog authors and our readers. In some ways they know more about the real us than some of our friends... us girlie bloggers don't tend to censor ourselves and as a result we are more "human" with each other - we experience the highs and the lows of each other's lives even if we are miles apart. Do you have friendships (or relationships?) that you can never have imagined having without the advent of the internet? Do you feel that you are more human with them, that you are less likely to hide your flaws and neuroses? Let me know in the comments.