all like to think that we have friends. But I wonder how many of us ever give any thought to just what it is that constitutes friendship.

The need for me to do so made itself very compelling about thirty years ago, when my first wife died. I remember saying in the months that followed that had someone asked me to compile a list of friends before her death and to do it again after her death, the two lists would have been remarkably different.

Many of the people who would have shown up on the first list would never have made the second. Which lead me to conclude that they had never really been friends. They had only been people I knew.

Now what’s the difference between the two?

Webster’s says that a friend is "someone attached to another by esteem, respect, and affection." I think that’s a terrible definition.

You see, by that definition, the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker could all be your friends.

I think we get a better clue as what constitutes friendship from something that Isaac Bashevis Singer once wrote: We know what a person thinks not when he tells us what he thinks, but by his actions.

And so analogously, it’s actions and not words that make for friendship.

In my case, there were people who took me to their bosom, so to speak, after my wife died, doing whatever they could to help me bear the pain.

And then there were people who only told me how sorry they were. Nothing more.

So let me suggest that you do something now that might prove to be invaluable at some time in the future when you’re facing a crisis. Ask yourself just what it is that constitutes a "friend." Then measure all the people you know against that yardstick.

Who knows, you could save yourself a lot of disappointment and heartache later on.

Think about it.