Getting Honest About Friendship

Betsey: Jane, I’ve been thinking lately about a question that’s been bothering me. Recently a young woman gave the children’s message at church, and she was talking about friendship and how hard it is to sustain one over time, and gave some examples of this from her own life. I suspect the grownups got at least as much out of this message as the kids! Certainly it made me think about my own friendships, and I realized I don’t really have any close friends from, say, college. You know, every now and then you hear about some group of friends that have known one another forever and get together for a “girls’ getaway” once a year or so. Do you have anyone like that? I think lives are so fluid now that it’s hard to maintain those connections (Facebook does NOT count).

Jane: Oh, nuts, that's too bad . . . because I've reconnected with some high-school and elementary-school classmates via Facebook, and it's been fun to exchange fluffy, encouraging comments from time to time. But you're right, Betsey, that's hardly friendship in the true sense of the word.

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if my Facebook friends and I actually got together in the same room.

We'd probably end up staring blankly at each other with very little to say! That's because for some strange reason I'm more outgoing on Facebook than I am in real life.

I look at my parents, especially my mom, and see how they still have these wonderful connections to high-school classmates. I wouldn't call these former classmates my parents' close, day-to-day friends, but they all share a childhood history they value highly. For my mom, attending her high-school reunion in Chicago remains a priority. I can't begin to relate to that . . . and sometimes, I feel sad that I can't. Jennifer Aniston once said ex-husband Brad Pitt was missing a “sensitivity chip.” Could I be missing some nostalgia gene, or some “friendship chip” that they have? I hope not!

Betsey: One of the things I really like about our friendship, yours and mine, is that we’ve reconnected. I think of people I used to be close to, say, from former churches and through work connections, and it’s sobering how people can drift in and out of our lives. If we see a friendship kind of dwindling, we don’t really exert effort to resuscitate it.

Jane: I know – and I'm sure I've been guilty of that. But here's a pet peeve, Betsey. I once had a friend who rarely initiated activities; if I didn't set up a lunch or breakfast, it wouldn't happen. That would put me in a funk because

it takes two to do friendship!

It finally dawned on me that this particular friendship was obviously more important to me than to her (I was slow on the uptake). Accepting this hard truth stung. But the older I become, the more easily I can accept a relationship for what it is, and if it fizzles out, I try to move on. I have to; life's too short.

Most friendships, I think, are situational anyway. But who's to say one of those more transitory relationships won't surprise you by reappearing and unexpectedly deepening? You can never write off that possibility!

Betsey: A couple of other things come to mind. One, what is a “friend”? Do you have to see each other all the time to be friends? Certainly there are people at church I count as friends, even though we don’t socialize much outside of that. Are people at work friends or just colleagues? I’ve actually heard people say that when they left a job, they just didn’t keep in touch with their former workmates as much as they expected to. It seems the definition of “friendship” is really slippery.

Jane: I've experienced friendships forged in the pressure mill of the workplace that I considered fairly tight. But after someone changed jobs or left for some other reason, the challenge became preventing that friendship from dying on the vine. I once had a close friend at work who just dropped me a year or so after she changed jobs – even though I made overtures to reconnect. The reality is,

once your common bond is removed, it becomes more difficult to maintain your ties.

You quickly discover if that specific friendship is deep enough to bridge the gap. Many aren't, and in the end that's okay, because new ones, hopefully, come along. Although I do think sometimes it's easier to make friends in certain seasons of life, and more difficult in others.

Betsey: So what makes someone “good at friendship”? I think I’m pretty good -- I’m not especially high-maintenance, I think I’m an okay listener, I’m funny. On the other hand, I can be introverted and things can get under my skin.

Jane: Anything you want to tell me, Betsey?

Joking aside, I'd like to think I'm a good friend too, but I can be easily hurt. And that's something I'm going to spend a lifetime overcoming.

In the end, I'm not sure how to define a “good” friend, except to say I think she's someone who can make you laugh (and you can make laugh, too!). She's someone with whom you can be your true self; someone who “gets you” in ways others might not and who accepts and treasures those things about you; someone who finds you important enough to schedule into her calendar with some regularity. I'm not suggesting good friends have to get together all the time; I think you can see each other infrequently and still be quite close if

you both want to make that effort, you both value nurturing the friendship.

AND – this is important, at least to me: Your conversation is mutually engaging. Some friends have made me feel my only function in our friendship is to be their sounding board because they monopolize the conversations. I want to say, “Hey, what about me? Aren't I in this friendship too?” But usually I'm too non-confrontational to do that. And that's a whole other topic!

Betsey, I could get on a roll on this friendship topic. I think we need to write a book!

Betsey: You are so right about the mutuality. I’ve known people who, when you’re talking with them, you share something about your life and they IMMEDIATELY turn it around and launch into a recital of what they’re up to. All about them. That bothers me a lot. And yes, I think we should write a book.

What are your biggest friendship challenges?