Like

So it's a Saturday night. I have two drunken people in my room. I wish I could say this is a regular occurrence, but it really isn't. Right now, I have kind of a rare occurrence happening. My two friends from high school (I have more than two, but for the sake of the story) have come to visit me this weekend. My friend Adam Bozarth (currently on the phone with his girlfriend for over two hours) is visiting from three hours away. He goes to school in Macomb, Illinois, at a school called Western Illinois University. He goes to school there among a lot of native Illinoisans, including many from Quincy. He is the lead singer/guitarist in our band, Analog, and while he was here in Beloit, we played a set at the C-haus, which is the only bar legally owned and operated by a private college in the United States. He's been here for two days now, it was fun.
My other friend that is visiting me is Andrew Mays, to whom I gave a shout-out in my initial blog post, because he introduced me to the blog world. Mays, whom I only address as 'Mays' and whom I only describe as 'my friend with red hair' is currently passed out on my bed, as both he and 'Boz' have induced a night of heavy drinking during their visit.
What I have to say about the whole situation is that it is highly unique that I get visitors from my high school (it happens maybe once a year at the most) and even more unique that they get drunk. I invited them on the 'special' occasion that I would be throwing a party and would give them both the opportunity to get really drunk. I guess I invited the situation by my words, but did not believe that such a surreal exercise would ever take place.
I had a lot of responsibility on my shoulders for this party to come through and it worked out that my responsibility did not turn out to be a bad thing. I was able to enjoy the fruits of my labor and bestow upon others the same fruit (some of the fruit had alcohol in it). The point of my story tonight is that you have to 'like' what you are doing in order for it to be worthwhile.
For the past few days, I've liked nothing but spending time with my familiar ladyfriend, who has since become my girlfriend (a huge step for each of us), but I thought to myself a few times that I don't even really like hanging out with my friends any more, because I really like hanging out with my girlfriend. But that's not true, and it took some really old friends of mine to make me realize that. Even though I haven't been with her for the past 24 hours, I've really had a good time despite being without her company.
Back in grade school, I remember having crushes on girls and 'liking' them. It was all about the 'like'. If you 'liked' a girl, that was it. 'Liking' a girl was the end-all, be-all of a girl/boy relationship back then. And most of the time, the girl that I 'liked' did not 'like' me back, so it didn't really matter. But I really like being in love. In fact, I 'like' it a lot more. And sometimes being in love means that you have to be apart and that you have to be able to like what the other person is doing without you. When you get to my age (listen to me!) like becomes an important part of the love. Love is a really strong word, possibly the strongest, and it takes A LOT of like to get love to be real and work.