Hi, my name is Twilight Sparkle, and I wanted to talk to you about friendship and yawning. Princess Twilight Sparkle, to be precise, but I don’t want my title to come in between what could be a great friendship.
So I’m sure you’re asking what friendship and yawning have to do with each other. I certainly wouldn’t have thought they were related before my mentor sent me to Ponyville all those years ago and I discovered the magic of friendship with my dearest friends.
But while there, Celestia expected a letter on friendship every week, and so I researched every aspect of the literature on friendship. When that was complete, I branched out and looked for any mention or reference to friendship in other fields, and I found something interesting when looking over a paper on yawning. It made a nice paragraph for the letter to Celestia, and then some crazy pony taunted a hydra into chasing them into Ponyville or something, and it promptly left my head.
But the facts remained in my memory.
It was only later that I thought of it again. Rarity’s funeral was a depressing affair, if thoroughly stylish, and Spike left afterwards to mope on his hoard. I was wandering through my memory palace when I recalled that yawning, while contagious, spreads faster and farther between friends than it does through strangers.
Sure, even the idea of yawning is contagious. Pony do as pony see, and all that. Dogs will yawn when they see other dogs or even ponies yawn. I suspect you’re yawning, or suppressing it, as you read this letter.
But when strangers yawn, another pony isn’t as likely to catch it as when someone closes to them does. An acquaintance yawning won’t spread it as much as a dear friend.
I also pondered exactly how yawning was so contagious, that the sight or just the concept could cause another pony to experience it as well. My dearest friends were all gone, and while I wished to experience that emotional closeness again, I couldn’t help but wonder if there was a way that I could recreate it again but faster.
Spike was caught up in his own private grief, and after four other funerals Luna and Celestia knew to give me time to recover, to let me focus on some new area of study.
During my months of studying the reports and literature on yawning, I discovered various interesting things. First, yawning wasn’t completely understood by pony scientists. Some thought it had to do with imitation and mirror neurons, but no one knew for sure.
I learned some trivial facts as well that amused Spike when he came by to check on me, and that I would like to share with you - for example, yawning while stretching is called pandiculation. It’s an amusing word.
Eventually, though, I ran up against the limit of current pony science on yawning. I branched out into neurology and psychology. Celestia was concerned, as these wider areas of research required drawing my focus away from my traditional responsibilities, but she gave in when I promised I was looking into friendship even deeper than ever before.
My studies clarified many things, but there were still things that I couldn’t explain about friendship. Spike and Luna were very nice when they suggested I give up on the research and moving on, but I needed to go further.
As a Princess of Equestria, I was able to write my own grant checks and waivers, and soon the team of experts I assembled ventured into new and amazing territories. Luckily, almost all of the volunteers recovered, many completely.
The end result of the research was a way to spread friendship between ponies in a way very similar to the spread of yawning between friends. Nothing as crude as a virus or even a spell, but instead the description, the very concept of friendship itself was made contagious when displayed in the proper way, as I demonstrated to the team one morning. I had always enjoyed the company of my fellow scientists, but afterwards we all felt a deep emotional connection, and they apologized for trying to run off and spoil the surprise before I could present it to Princess Celestia in the proper way. It was like I had Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and Rarity back again, but even better. I wanted everypony to be that close to me.
Before that could happen, we needed to optimize my initial demonstration. We improved the speed so that everypony would experience it almost instantly, and I felt ready to share my findings. I left researching the proper presentation of friendship for griffons and other non-pony inhabitants to the team, and travelled to Canterlot.
Princess Celestia was overjoyed by my report despite a few initial concerns, and Luna soon agreed with me. Showing it to the many cities and villages wasn’t as quick, but I held out. I was overcome with tears of joy when the Crystal Empire finally started talking to me again to discuss their friendship, as it meant all of Equestria were my dearest friends, and it was so nice to chat with Shining Armor and Princess Cadance again.
By that happy day, much of Griffonia and the Buffalo herds had also become my friend. It wasn’t that many decades before everyone alive on the planet could honestly say I was their deepest and dearest friend.
But it wasn’t enough. Unicorn mages had always wondered if other worlds existed, and there were massive parties when some bright young scholars broke through the walls between existences to find new potential friends.
It took longer to find a way to spread our friendship to the new people we found, but it was worth it when the last city on the planet joined us in friendship.
From there it continued, and we almost always found a way to become dear friends with the inhabitants of the strange and beautiful places we found. I’m proud to say that at this point I am the dear friend of every living intelligent species I know of, over five hundred different species at this point. Except for yours.
Still, after all these years there’s an old legacy of that initial research that I’ve never found the way to work around. So I hope you’re not yawning too much right now, but won’t you be my friend?