Who Needs Friends When You Have Kids?

I've written before about how difficult it can be to make new friends once you become an adult, and how it's even harder for stay-at-home moms.

It's now two years after that initial friendship post and unfortunately, not much has changed on the friend front. In fact, things are even worse. While I've made exactly ZERO new real friends in the past two years, at least two of my mommy friends have moved away...to a different school district, maybe, or a different county, a different state.

Luckily, my kids are now two years older and therefore much better conversationalists. They are my new(ish) friends! And if I want adult conversation, I have my DH to turn to. Pathetic? (Well, honestly, they are way more fun than most of the people around here anyway.)

My husband encourages me to be friendlier and more outgoing. He does this because he knows I wouldn't mind having more friends. He wants me to be happy.

But it's not as if I can change my whole personality. Right? I mean, people don't actually manage to toss off their introverted tendencies and become outgoing types with suddenly packed social calendars, do they?

And it's not like I'm horribly lonely or wallowing in self-pity: I love my life, I'm happy. I don't think about my lack of friends on a daily basis.

Probably because I actually do have lots and lots of friends. Tons! They just aren't local. They are pals from childhood, high school, college, my 20's. They live in Chicago, Seattle, England, Israel, Australia, and so on and so forth. They are scattered around the world--pretty much everywhere except within 30 miles of my house.

I rarely (never?) see my far-flung friends. We don't speak on the phone. Hell, we don't even email anymore. It's come down to the occasional Facebook comment or message.

With some of my "friends," if you break down our communication over the past few decades years, it boils down to the equivalent of "LOL" or " :-) ."

My friendships have been reduced to emoticons and acronyms.

These are the people I used to spend HOURS talking to--either on the phone when we were teens, in our dorm during college, or over coffee (or beers) in the city during our single days.

Yeah, it's sorta sad. But it's also life. I'm pretty much okay with it.

People move on. Priorities change. It's not just about us anymore. No one has time for hours-long conversations anymore.

And discussing ad nauseum the strengths and weaknesses of your and your friends' children will JUST NEVER EVER be as exciting as dissecting what it could have possibly meant when Johnny looked at you in 10th-grade social studies class. Sigh.

What to do?

For now I'll just bitch about it in my blog.

"Everyone Is the Age of Their Heart." - Guatemalan Proverb

Ha-ha-ha, what a lie....

I think I might be having a mid-life crisis. All I know for sure is that I've been struggling lately, and I decided putting my thoughts and feelings down in words might help me sort it out. So please bear with me.

I've been feeling really nostalgic lately--not the good kind when you fondly remember past fun times, but the yucky kind when you feel not quite present in the present (if that makes any sense). I'm not nostalgic for any particular time or place or person, but rather I miss the way I used to be and feel and relate to the world.

Ahhh, those were the good ol' days. Too bad I didn't
appreciate it. "Youth is wasted on the young" as they say.

When I was younger, the way I looked played a big part in how I related to people--especially men, of course. A young woman's allure can be a useful and powerful thing. I wasn't one of those who used her looks to unfairly take advantage of a situation (unless the guy was a jerk and deserved it) but I certainly enjoyed the attention my appearance got me over the years. So shoot me. And there is no doubt a woman's allure can open doors.

Because the way I was treated was partially due to my appearance, of course how I looked became a significant part of my identity (as it does for most people, whether they admit it or not).

Now that I'm getting older, I feel myself teetering on the precipice of undesirable and this leaves me feeling a bit rudderless. While an older woman can "look good for her age," (and there's always that crushing "for her age" added on at the end) she will never again be a hot, young girl. An older woman is more experienced and (hopefully) wiser than her younger counterpart--and this is certainly something to celebrate--but it doesn't change the fact that she is no longer viewed as desirable by the world in general. And that sucks.

Nowadays when I walk past a construction site, I bristle in anticipation of the cat-call, but when it doesn't come, instead of feeling relieved I'm deflated. Life is more boring this way.

The questions I ask myself are these: What is my identity now? How do others see me (and do I really want to know)? What's my role in this world supposed to be? Yes, I'm a wife, mother, daughter, sister, etc., but who am I deep down inside?

All I know is, the girl I once was is no more and I miss her, hot mess that she was.

Does everyone have such problems as they age, or am I just vainer than most? My guess is it's about 50/50. Maybe it's especially difficult right now because it's only recently that I've started feeling, well, not old exactly...just not young anymore. Maybe, instead of getting worse as I age, I'll get used to feeling this way and it won't bother me as much?

I certainly hope so.