On Friendship
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I have wonderful friends. I’ve collected them over the years and I hold them dear. I think about them, where they are, who they’ve become. I miss them. Something about adulthood, about parenthood, makes it hard to see them and talk to them as much as I’d like.
I think I’m a pretty good friend. A thoughtful one. But something has occurred to me recently. I’ve realized that I am a really good friend during the best times, and worst. I tend to be around, and available, to my friends when they are experiencing true joys – engagements, and weddings, and babies, and professional successes. Or. Or when they are suffering, really suffering. When they are dealing with sickness, or heartbreak, or loss. I am proud of my ability to be there for my friends when they really need support.
But am I good friend during the regular times, the times that are neither triumphant nor tragic? I don’t know. These tend to be the quiet times in my friendships, the times when days and weeks and months slip by without true contact or connection. These tend to be the times when laziness – or is it just real life? – takes over. I don’t know. But I think it is worth thinking about. Because maybe, just maybe, it is these “normal” times when friendship matters most?
What, really, does it mean to be a good friend? Do you think that there is something about adulthood and/or parenthood that makes maintaining friendships much harder?
I know for me, if a friend isn’t around during the normal times, the everyday bits of life that make up the majority of the time, I find I am far less apt to want to call on them during the really hard or really good times. On the other hand, having children and trying to keep my head above water pretty much does take up all my time these days, so I do have more understanding for my friends these days than I did pre-kid!
I think you’re touching on something really important here. I need that contact during the regular times to sustain a friendship. Otherwise the outreach during joyous or hard times – while it may be genuine – feels awkward.
I think we are approaching a time of life when many of the early joys – specifically weddings and new babies – are wrapping up. And people may or may not have a tragedy befall them any time soon (hopefully not). So this means that we risk entering a phase of life where, in the absence of anything “major,” the friendship atrophies.
Also, if I think about how your frienships were formed – in childhood and college – it was through spending lots and lots of “normal” time together. We passed notes in class. We went to Friday night football games. We watched way too much TLC piled up in people’s dorm rooms. We picked up slushies when someone was having a rough day. Those are the things that create a friendship in the first place, right?
You definitely gave me something to think about. So true. It takes a really good friend to notice when you just need a friend in everyday life, not just during the extreme ups or downs.
Why is it harder to maintain friends as we become parents? uh…dinners, homework, keeping a house clean, keeping people relatively happy, creating some semblance of tradition established or maintained, a host of activities, driving the bus…hmmm, now I see why I don’t have those huge slumber parties I used to have.
I think about this question too. I feel myself drifting away from some of my close female friends now that we’re reaching that stage of “wrapping up” that Gale describes. For me, it has a lot to do with distance, with the fact that my husband and I have a life that exists 600 miles away from many of our friends. Meanwhile, I have a new circle of women friends with whom I share the day-to-day ins and outs of my life. I know those older friendships are still alive, but I’m not sure they will ever have the same dimension they had when we shared more of that day-to-day connection.
I used to be the guy that would go out of his way to carry the friendship. I understand that people get busy and caught up with life, but I made a point to check in with people consistently.
It was important to me to maintain connections during the normal times as well as good/bad.
But I got fed up with it and stopped. Some of my friends noticed and made a point to check in and ask if I was ok. Others didn’t and we haven’t had any contact in quite some time.
I didn’t do this to be mean, create drama or even to make a point. I just reached a point where I felt like I couldn’t do it on my own anymore.
We moved a short while ago and a couple of people reached out and asked me to fill them in on why we moved. I surprised myself by telling them that if they bothered to call they might know.
Long answer longer, I don’t think that most people intend to be bad friends but I think that if it is important you reach out during normal times. It doesn’t have to be a long conversation or 10,000 word email- but some sort of contact is important.
Louise is right, it is not always easy to share with those who fall off the wagon.
You’re right – one should be “present” in a friendship, even at “regular” times when life just runs its normal course.
But I do believe that friendships that have established themselves over years and years can also survive times of little contact with the understanding that the other person will still be there in an instant if needed.
I think your right, that normal times are so important in friendships. Having moved many miles, I still keep in close contact with my friends at home and have made new ones here. It so nice just to talk about anything, rather than when the need is urgent or supporting.
I think your right, that normal times are so important in friendships. Having moved many miles, I still keep in close contact with my friends at home and have made new ones here. It so nice just to talk about anything, rather than when the need is urgent or supporting.
I think, as sad as it may seem, there are times in your life when friendship is a function of convenience. These are the friends that you have access to easily – either proximity or timing. But, that is not to say that you cannot have dear, close friends – your best friends – that stay with you through thick and thin, through long times of no contact. I feel blessed that I have friends where we know in our hearts that we are best friends but don’t put pressure on ourselves to get together as often as we’d truly like. Life happens and with young kids and busy work schedules, face-to-face connection can be difficult logistically.
As I grow older, the friends I cherish are the ones I know I can count on at 3:00 a.m.
I’ve accepted (sometimes painfully so) that some friends come in and out of one’s life. And most of the time it isn’t anyone’s fault.