First, in honor of the great, beautiful, humorous, intelligent Nookie, we are having cheesecurds...with french fries and poutine! She is THE BEST! But you already knew that.
IRL, aside from in-person friendships born from the net, what kind of friend are you? How do you maintain your friendships? Are you friends satisfied with that? Do you like having a lot of friends, or a handful? Has this changed over the years? If so, why?
Whew. I don't mean you have to answer all those questions, just things to ponder as you respond.
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23 comments:
*smoooooch*
Are you going to try it? :-)
I'm a terrible friend. I don't keep in touch enough. I have one best friend in Montreal. It can be months before we talk to each other. However, once we do get in touch, it's like we have never been apart. Whenever I go back to Montreal for a visit, I always make sure I drop in to visit her and her family.
I'm the same way with my best friends online. I don't call them (I really should) and emails are sporadic. I do have the daily contact of blogs and email with them though.
I've never had a lot of friends. I always had a boyfriend so usually my life revolved around him and his friends.
For a while, I lived with my twin sister so she and I went out partying together. Then, when I was living on my own, my other sister was my best friend and she and I would do many things together. Then I met my best friend S and she and I hung out.
I really really miss having girl friends that I can meet for coffee or go see a movie. We used to have girls night out here at work, dinner and a movie. I always enjoyed those evenings. Lots of laughs. However, I have since realized that they aren't people I would want as a friend. They are too bigoted.
You have no idea how surprised & excited I was. Had we not gotten home at 8pm last night, we'd have had homemade fries with poutine!
Thank you!!!!
I keep forgetting you are a twin. You obviously got all the looks & personality...there CAN'T be two people as fabulous as you. /end suckup
I think that I kind of suck as a friend. I try to be a good friend and my intentions are to be a good friend but that isn't always how it works out.
I am always there for my friends when they need something. I think that's a good thing but beyond that, I think I'm not really worthy of the friends that I do have.
That's how I feel Carey.
I think you hit on the most important part of a friendship. They are there for each other when needed. I suppose, if we weren't good friends, then our friends would walk away from us. I think we are doing something right.
P.S. Baking cookies will always guarantee a friendship LOL.
I am a sucky friend, too. I NEVER call (I don't really enjoy talking on the phone...really, I don't call my family either). I rarely write (maybe once/year) and don't plan get-togethers enough.
Part of my problem is that I've always had friends from different social spheres and they don't mix particularly well. I used to make more of an effort to either mix them or keep up with them all. Once I got married, there were too many groups, too many family events, that I got a little more choosy about how we managed our social time.
I have the military wives...I make a point of doing dinner or girls night with them 3-4 times/year. They all help bear that burden.
I have my old high school friends that live allover WI. We all suck at getting together (only one of us makes a good effort).
We have our old drinking buddies and that is fizzling. We don't have much in common with them anymore. It's a friendship circle I wouldn't mind letting go, but they don't feel the same. I still try to make an effort twice/year.
I think this is why I don't go to class reunions. I'm afraid of people expecting to rekindle friendships & I really don't want to.
Nookie-I also miss more girl time.
LOL. When in doubt, buy your friendships with cookies. *giggle*
I think that's part of why I don't do reunions too. If I wanted to be in touch with those people, I would be. I guess it would be nice to see how people turned out but that's not enough motivation for me to go to some fancy dinner.
*makes note to bake Kim some cookies*
*grin*
It takes me quite a while to make friends. Then I move.
One of my best friends from grad school didn't become a friend for a couple years. That whole time we worked together, went for coffee and chatted, but we are both fairly private and it took that long to be friends.
Later in grad school, I remembered being lonely the first 6 months I was there and it seemed such a waste. By the time I left I had great friends (and some great buddies) and they were pretty much the same people as were there when I started.
It's made me realise that friendship takes me a while and I try to be a little more open.
Coco and I have stayed in touch since high school. (We did go to university at the same time.)
I'm an OK friend. I think I'll go fire off a couple emails today actually to some people I'd like to stay in touch with.
I would like to add that one of the biggest reasons that I don't have friends down here has a lot to do with being childless and agnostic. I have made several attempts at trying to make friends in the neighborhood by getting involved in the community newsletter, HOA etc., and then I have also tried attending Scrapbooking events. However, the conversations ALWAYS end up being about their children, schools and church. That's fine. That's their life and I do enjoy hearing about people's children, but when that's all they are about, I realize that we don't have anything in common so no friendship develops.
Oh and Kim, I think you would make a great best friend. I could see me having lots of fun with you.
I think the decision has been made, Nookie & I must move closer. *gets out map to find halfway point*
I completely agree, Nookie. Being childless (and commuters) has made it very difficult for us to find friends in Spring Green. All the childless people hide at home, I think. We've met a total of two couples that I could see us spending time with. One we never followed through with...now there is a new couple (just moved here from PA) I'm going to be more pro-social about. *promises self*
In high school, most of my friends were guys. I actually just got an email from one of them. It's been 3 days and I haven't replied yet LOL.
I just want to ditto most of what Nookie has said, and Kim too.
I have a handful of friends, but none are real close friends. Most people who are my age that I knew were still single, with or without a child and more drinking buddies than anything. I don't much get along with many of the kids' friend's parents because we are in different places in their lives. Most are stay home moms with lots of cash and no real desire to do anything beyond thier kids. Most everyone I work with is much older, which is fine, but...again, we are in different places in our lives. *shrug* Of course, there is also the fire dept wives, but there are only a couple of them that I enjoy spending time with a few times a year.
Maybe I'm just too picky. Or opinionated. Or something.
Between work and the kids and the house and Larry, I don't seem to have a lot of time for spending time with friends or spending time making new friends. I, too, miss having friends to meet for a drink or coffee or whatever. But then I remember that most of the time, I don't have time. One of my closest friends lives less than a mile from me. I haven't seen her since Christmas due to our schedules. But we email regularly.
I was just inspired to email a friend I haven't seen years and our mutual friends to schedule a girl night. Hopefully it works out.
I have 2 or 3 really close friend, but only 1 that I share everything with. I have a bunch of just regular friends. My closest friend and I talk on the phone nearly every day and email each other all day long at work. The other pretty close ones and I email off and on during the week and talk on the phone at least once a week and try to get together at least onece a month. My other friends or either work friends or occasionally party friends. It seems as we get older we have less and less time for our friends, but we still all know that each other is there for the other and will make time if ever really needed.
I love to be surrounded by friends. Lots of them. I even like spending my entire vacation with them staying at the cottage. One of my favorite things is waking up at the cottage with a houseful and cooking a huge breakfast for everyone.
I've been told that I'm a great friend even though I don't always feel that way. We've got seven couples that we hang out with on a fairly regular basis and one single guy that we even travelled to Alaska to visit. My RL friends are like family to me and I would be completely lost without them.
Between Dave and I, I'm the social butterfly. He would be quite happy to be alone all the time, so I'm the one who makes the plans. I've also fallen into that roll in our circle of friends. They tend to rely on me to plan stuff. Sometimes I wish that I could sit back and have someone else do the planning but then I realize that I'd never be satisfied unless I was in the middle of it anyways. *grin*
My friend in Alaska and I email and MSN for the most part. He stays with us when he comes to visit during the summer. The rest of our friends are all in the same town so it's easy to stay in touch. We're always doing each other favors or borrowing stuff so we see each other quite often. We all walk into each other's homes without knocking and I spend much more time with them than I do with my family.
Most of the couples have teenagers now. It's long been a joke how we always camped on a separate site when their kids were little so we could escape the madness if we wanted to. Sometimes it's difficult because they're tied down with their kids while we're not but I've watched these kids grow up and feel extremely close to most of them. I love kids, as long as they belong to someone else. *grin*
Our circle went through a rough time in 2005. As you might remember, one of the couples split up and it caused a pile of drama and hurt feelings. Things have settled down now and our group is still intact, minus the ex-wife.
It's because of her that I sometimes feel like a bad friend. Even though everyone tells me I've gone above and beyond for her, I still feel bad how things have ended up and that we're not friendly anymore.
*passes list of friends to Lights* Could you be a dear & contact these people for me? I'd love to get together with them.
I'll get right on that. *grin*
Dear Friends of Weltek,
Get off your lazy butts and call her! She misses you! Plan something fun and exciting to do with her. She deserves it. If you're really nice she might even bring cheese.
Sincerely,
lights
Social Secretary
Weltek & Nolay Inc.
There's a special plate of cheese just for you lightsy. *smooch*
I. am a terrible friend, especially IRL. I have lots of "friends" from high school that I still see occasionally, but none that I would call if I needed something. While we were very close in HS and a few years in college, and talk when we see each other, we are not that close in reality, even though we all would like to think we are.
In reality I have three close IRL friends. These three are closer to me than my sisters even thought of being. We are completely different but we compliment each other so much. This is where I become the terrible friend. They are actually used to and expect me not to keep in touch. They know that sometimes I am just far too busy or whatever. But they also know that I am here, whenever they need it. I have tried being better, but I hate talking n the phone, I hate having people show up announonced, and also do not feel that I need to be with my friends four out of seven days a week to show them that I care about them.
It is hard for me to make close friends, but once I do, I am a friend always, and my closest friends know this.
I never had a lot of friends growing up but I was always very close to the ones I had. I think I had a knack for picking good friends and most of the people that I call my good friends now I've known since high school or college so between 18-22 years. I dont see my friends near as often as when we were all single and fancy free and all that but we do get together at least once a year or more and catch up.
In fact friends had been my all for so many years that when I did finally start to have romantic relationships and serious romantic relationships it always felt a bit weird becuase I was so used to being around my friends more than any other person in particular. Of course, life, love, marriage and babiees are changing all of that but even Tara has seen how some of my friends look to me as a brother, uncle, cousin of sorts and how their children look at me the same and love me as if I were part of the family. It's going to be a time of change for me and several of my close friends as I'm less able to spend time being part of their families to build my own.
I am an awesome friend. I still have a couple of friends from childhood that I keep in touch with and a number of friends I've made and kept over the years. A couple of them I only talk to once or twice a year but we always pick up where we left off because we know each other so well the connection can never be broken.
I generally e-mail every week, call a couple times a month to most of my friends and send post cards when I remember to put them in the mail (I'm really good about writing them tho).
Oddly, besides Jody and my sis, my DIL is one of my best friends. She said she was in the right line when she hit the jackpot with her MIL. I had the most amazing MIL myself and wanted to be as good as she was to me.
I like having lots of friends and making new ones. And I love that old saying about friendships new and old, one is silver the other is gold. I treasure them all.
Great topic Kim. *smooch*
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