I think I'm a pretty good friend. It's not something that I had really ever thought about until somewhat recently when I realized that several people that I thought were good friends... welll... that they weren't good friends. Looking at their actions, I was taken aback. I knew that I would never put people that I considered my friends into the situation that they had put me (and - more importantly - my husband).
I am always willing to go the extra mile for my friends - regardless of how well you know me, I'm the one you can call when your car breaks down at 2am or need a helping hand moving into your new home.
Tonight, my friend Caitlin will be moving into our apartment for about a month. She's preparing to leave for the peace corps and, somehow, she's out an apartment for the month before she leaves or so... she didn't have to ask... The Universe and I didn't think twice when she was over for dinner and said, "I don't know where I'm going to be living." Our natural and immediate response was, "Well - why don't you come live with us?"
Loyalty and honesty are very important to me. That's just the way I am.
At times, being my friend is probably hard, though. My bipolar can make me difficult to deal with and I can easily become convinced that I've done something wrong to hurt you when nothing has actually happened... as such, there are lots of times when I have concocted reasons to put up barriers between myself and others that are almost entirely delusional.
But - those are issues that I try to make my friends aware of so that they understand when I get a little nutty.
So... yeah. Good thread.