A friendship should not require repeated emergencies to feel meaningful.

Some relationships only come alive during a crisis. The intensity feels like intimacy, and the flat weeks in between feel like nothing, so problems become the thing that generates contact. That pattern is exhausting and it also quietly rewards trouble. A friendship that can be sustained by ordinary conversation is more durable than one that runs on emergencies.

Check whether your contact with someone tracks the level of drama in your lives. If it does, initiate something during a calm week with no news to report. Learning to be close when nothing is wrong is the harder skill.