Thursday 10 August 2006

Making friends - the new dating

It may seem ridiculous to some of you faithful readers, but making friends is not my forté. In fact, I really suck at it. Well, maybe that’s a little harsh, as one of my friends put it...”you can’t suck at it because you have at least one great friend” (Thanks, Paul). But I have such high friend standards that I am very reluctant to get out of my shell for just anybody, in the fear that they may annoy the heck out of me and then I am stuck with them.

When I do meet somebody that I feel an instant friend-vibe with, I tend to let my guard down (little by little) and it usually produces a fantastic friendship that continues beyond time and physical location. I have about 5 of these friends. Maybe 6. Yup, 6. In my whole life, I have 6 friends that actually know the real me and, despite that, still love me. And vice versa. Most importantly vice versa. And they are all independent friends. That is, they do not know each other or have anything in common other than knowing me.

As I am starting to see it, I am a bit of a friend snob. My friends need to have something in common with me BESIDES the fact that I am pregnant, a teacher, a blonde, etc. Those superficial type things. It needs to be something like common outlook on things, shared history, ability to be retarded and make each other laugh, love of fine shopping and margaritas, or just being my best friend since grade 3.

Does that make me a bad person? Or hard to befriend? Probably. People used to tell me that I have this air of judgement, like I am always judging others. The truth to that is, I am just keeping my shield up to prevent others from getting too close without my approval. And maybe, rather than calling it judging, I would call it discerning whether or not I want to start anything up with them.

My discernment is really a precautionary measure for this reason: how do you dump a friend that you started to hang out with only to realize that she/he drives you insane? When you’re dating, you just give them the old “it’s not you, it’s me” or “I think we should see other people”. Does that work on non-romantic relationships? I really don’t know, and I don’t think I want to find out.

So here’s to the friends that I love with all of my heart and would do anything for. You know who you are, and thanks for not seeing me as the snob I am sure that I am. I am truly blessed to have you in my life, even if my life is now 3000 km away from yours.

2 comments:

  1. Having had to dump such creepy instant-friends that I realized I really couldn't bear, I feel your pain. It's not snobbery, and it doesn't make you a bad person!

    I think the dating analogy is particularly apt, though ;)

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  2. [...] I spend so much time on the computer just to feel like I have friends and family close by, which I don’t.  I would not call 4 provinces and 3000 km away “close by.” If I was better at making friends, I wouldn’t have this problem.  I am not, however, what you would call a social butterfly, and I look at other moms pushing their strollers and long to scream out “HELLO!  CAN I BE YOUR FRIEND?”  But I don’t.  That’s just not me.   Read my old post: “Making riends: the new dating.”. [...]

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