Most friendships in reality are built on convenience, routine, or proximity, not some deep meaningful bond. Once the shared environment disappears, so does the relationship. A big part of what people call “friendship” is just structured social habit — people to talk to so life feels less empty or repetitive. In that sense, having friends isn’t automatically valuable. It depends entirely on whether the connection actually adds anything to your life or just fills silence. Some people are better off alone than surrounded by low-quality connections they feel obligated to maintain.
Eh, yes and no.
A lot of friendships do start out based on proximity, convenience, etc but can grow into something deeper and lasting. Like, many of my friends in school growing up all had last names near mine in the alphabet. Two of those I still hang out with decades later.
When you leave college and go into the real world on your own, you find out which ones were built on convenience and which were lasting. I couldn’t tell you how many “friends” I had in college, but since graduating, I probably only keep in touch with about 10 of them regularly.
Reminds me of the saying “Relatives are who you were born into, family is who you choose”.