Friends With Benefits

We can make it out there with a lot less trauma 

if we see everyone as family [or, even better, as friends], 

and we understand that we are all standing arm in arm on the 

precipice of disaster if we don't embrace the fact that 

we are truly surrounded by a new, improved definition 

of what it means to be related.

from "Facebook Family", When You Know by dena parker duke

Through the years, finding friends has often been a slog. I kept finding myself trying to connect to all the wrong people and always feeling like I was to blame. In a way, I was because I was not discerning or thoughtful in the right ways. I thought way too much about what others thought about me instead of listening to my gut or listening carefully to who they were and what they needed (hint: it wasn't always ME or vice versa!). It's taken years for me to learn how to cultivate genuine friends and ferret out new, authentic ones. But another benefit to a long life is in learning to appreciate how friendships come in all sizes, shapes, and durations. I have learned to appreciate the diversity in friendships and not to expect anyone to be the end-all for me, or for them, thus tempering expectations all the way around. The struggle has been real but so has the gift. I suppose you can have too many superficial friends, but most of us long for more of the deep sustaining ones.    

They say it's harder and harder to make friends the older you get. 

But what do they know? 

I never thought at my age that I would see a resurgence in friendships, and it has even become a surge. Coming off a year of reconnecting with old friends all the way back to grade school; to embracing a long-lost dear friend I first met at work; to finally befriending my own sister after all these years; having an initial pull towards someone blossom into a deep sharing kind of friend; but also having a new fun-loving friendship form in an instant; seeking and successfully establishing some connections that are 100% pure support; and to keep cultivating with intention the friends that I have, has made for quite an unexpected surge.

By the time you read this, I will have been to my high school reunion! 

Not everyone is thrilled at the prospect of going to a reunion, but for me this was a milestone. There was the obvious shock that 50 years had passed since 1975, but when I think of who I was 50 years ago I have to give myself a lot of grace. Back then, I was coming off three long years as the last child left in the house with troubled parents, and it had taken a toll. Although there was little energy for a carefree senior year full of dances, boys, and looking ahead at life, I had a close friend (since 7th grade) to see me through the years. I admit I wasn't able to talk to her about what was happening then, and yet, she was a lifeline to life outside those walls. Even though there were big parts of me she didn't know (and vice versa), we lived vicariously through each other. When I accidentally became a cheerleader in 9th grade, she joked that she experienced it too, and she's not wrong about that because we did it together. What she doesn't know is that when I walked into her house, I was soaking up all the vibes of a family life that felt much more stable than mine. Getting stuck in traffic allowed, for the first time, a deep conversation about our families and what was really going on and why we couldn't share any of it at the time. She was able to share as much of her heartache as I was. We also laughed over a vicarious prom adjacent experience we had together (that's another story!). While I always dreamed of having a conversation, I had no idea that we would actually do it, just 50 years later. 

Have you ever met someone and said, "We have got to get together!" every time you see them (and mean it!)? Not long ago, I finally sat with such an acquaintance politely over cookies and grapes. Before we knew it two or three hours had passed. We realized the other one could relate to being deeply challenged in a significant relationship, and we talked and talked about things no one else will ever understand. That was a connection that felt like a miracle.

Have you ever met someone and had an instant connection right out of the gate?? I was recently sent a DM on Facebook by someone asking if we could meet for coffee. I was a little hesitant as one should be on social media, but she explained that when she saw both of our poetry books on display together at Rediscovered Books she wanted to meet. I looked up her book and it was a beauty- the cover taken from one of her own paintings. I couldn’t wait to meet her. When I walked into Oldspeak Book Bar I saw her knowing smile across the room and as soon I sat down the words, the laughter, and the joint admiration all began to flow. Before we knew what hit us we were sharing poetry back and forth (which is more personal than if we had shared bank account numbers!). And I found myself confiding in her things that I would never tell most people, like how poetry feels like it’s alive, somehow knowing that she knew what I meant, but also even putting our heads together for some good old fashioned gossiping. I can now say I’ve lived long enough to understand what it means to become fast friends: the talk is fast and the connection immediate!

Finding friendship is a great reminder that you never know how or when love might come your way, and it can come in many forms. It is nice when it surprises you, assuming you are open. It takes some chemistry and even some luck. Over time, it also takes work. But it's a great model for being open, staying open, and reaching out to someone- even taking a chance to reach back. But then, what a heartbreak it can be to truly lose a friend for whatever reason, or to have cut ties with someone. That is also a story for another time. 

But it's also a great reminder about keeping our connection to ourselves alive. 

The reality is you may not encounter a surprise friendship any time soon, even if you are staying open to it. We can't always control where we live and what resources are alive within our reach. And it sounds silly to say "Be your own best friend!", even if it's true. But all the best tools for maintaining friendships (i.e., reaching out, staying connected & interested, hanging in during hard times, active listening, laughing together, and so on) are also the best tools for maintaining the one friendship that will be with us until the very end, the one we have with ourselves. I have had to learn the hard way to make that friendship my very best one. 

I have had to make my primary friendship my best one!

The reason friendship feels more available to me now is the fact that I understand I have always been searching for things outside myself. That never helped me in the friendship department, and it kept me from really connecting. I am bending over backwards to stay enamored with that primary friendship and do the work of giving myself the kind of friendliness I want to offer and receive from others. If I hadn't been doing that, I would not have jumped when I saw the possibilities of new friendships or ways to deepen existing ones when they presented themselves to me. Going to my high school reunion was a way to celebrate friendship, and as one old tongue-tied flame stood up and so eloquently explained, it was also a celebration of the era of our childhoods, which was a golden time in history. To be surrounded by familiar (and some not so familiar) faces that are all the same age who share that history in time was a reminder of friendships in all their forms: from missed opportunities, to old longings, and shared experiences we had to unearth, and the highlights we couldn't all agree on, it was a celebration of friendship, both big and small. It tied all the angst and awkwardness of first friendships to the thread of how we all weave friendship into and out of the rest of our lives. And it was a huge reminder that…

It is never too late to make a new friend, 

even one from high school!

May it be so.