Growing up in a very small town, I had many friends....yes many. Eventhough my high school class had only about 50+ students, we were all very close knit. As I moved on to college, I reflected back and realized those friends were wonderful....yes - we had so much in common. We had the same background and interests and experienced all the early important life lessons together. We played sports together, cried over boyfriends together, and even argued and fought - together. I didn't appreciate that till much later. In college, my friends were not - the same. I think I expected them to be the same as growing up. The same backgrounds,interests, challenges that I was facing. In fact, I realized they were mostly 'from the city'. They had no clue what FFA was or had never slow danced on a country road. In fact, our lives seemed like polar opposites. I had a few good friends, but overall, we were never going to be life long 'BFFs' due to these simple rudimentary facts of not understanding where each other had been - and the road we traveled to get there.
As we moved to the city after college for work, over 3 hours away from where we grew up, we quickly realized how alone we felt. Our only real friends were friends we had met through work. We lived in the suburbs, newly married without kids, and didn't know a sole. Eventually I'll expand more beyond this, but I became a runner. Note - I was NEVER a runner. I played competitive sports often - softball and volleyball growing up and many recreational sports along the way. BUT, never running. It always posed the question - why run? Well, long story short, I watched a close friend (from the super duper small town) run one of the major world marathons and I became inspired. I ran that same race 12 months later myself after never running a race before in my life....and to this day, I have run 5 total full marathons and a dozen halves and 50+ smaller ones. I regress....the first 'real friend' I met after college, outside of work, was in my first marathon training group I joined. We were randomly in the same pace group and spent every Saturday morning together for 18 weeks while running our long runs together...with all the time in the world to talk. It was GREAT! Someone else, in the burbs, without kids, who I could honestly relate to. Six years later, we both have two kids and work and are very close.
Outside of her, it was very difficult. Looking back no on the last 'post-kids' years, I can realize one basic fact. Kids = Friends. This may not make sense to most, but it's true. Once your kids are born, you are thrown into a new world of play dates/music classes/church groups where other moms of kids your age are also 'there'. For no other reason in this world would you encounter these people or would they be your friends...but they are! I didn't really realize this fact until about two years ago, we were invited over to a BBQ at a new 'friend's' house for the afternoon. Each mom brought their hubby (who none of us had met or met the other dads) and their babies. Boy was it an eclectic group. None of us knew each other until we were thrown into this situation known as: motherhood at the exact same time with our first born children. We had not much in common except for that pure and simple fact: our kids were doing everything at the exact same time and we could talk for hours about it :)
My concept of friendship quickly changed. No longer do these people know my path in life to how I got here. But they understand a basic fact - what I'm going through right now that no one else in the world can possibly understand. These women became my solace. They helped me through everything. I remember one time riding the train home in the afternoon when my twins were 18 months old. I sat down next to a woman with a stroller who's daughter seemed to be about the same size as my kids. Naturally, I struck up a conversation and it was perfect. I knew nothing about her but quickly realized our kids were 4 days apart in age and we were in the same hospital at the same time - 18 months prior. As our stop approached, I realized - this girl will be my friend. How creepy is that??? Seriously, I had made friends throughout my whole life so easily and quickly realized this mom was too good of a gal to not have a friendship with. So, biting my tongue, we got off the train and I handed her my card. YES...my business CARD. What a dork....what a creep. I asked her to come over for a play date with my twins some time. As I walked to my car from that train that day I had pretty much convinced myself that I sounded like a child molester... ha ha. But surprisingly, a few days later, I got an email - and we got together. It was fun...it was great....and then I realized the kicker - she also grew up downstate and we had similar interests growing up.
Wow...I'm such a dork. But really - at this time of my life - everything is so different. I work 40+ hours a week, I commute, I cart my kids to ten buck two and back - and I run. When will I ever, in the near future, be in random social settings to meet new friends who are LIKE ME? Exactly... never.
Now, I realize to keep these relationships strong and worth while, I really have to work at it. It takes lots of time. I email them throughout the day, we talk on facebook to each other, and we meet for moms night. What has been the hardest part about it - is one simple fact. She is a stay-at-home mom who stepped away from the corporate world (from a job she didn't like) to raise her family. Are sometimes my tinges of jealousy directed towards that lifestyle - maybe. But never at her. She seems to 'get it'. What my struggles are with work/kids/hubby/time/rat race - she is my 'vent'. And it is great!
Well, this week was her birthday. Yes, the short work week right before Thanksgiving. We had one night that worked to go out for drinks after our kids were ushered to bed by their daddies. So, we met up and had a fabulous time catching up on everything. So yes, friendships only work when you put in time....and sometimes lots of it. But the return is immeasurable and wonderful. But....I still have my 'other half' of my world - work. That particular night I had a slew of work that had to be done before the next morning. I returned home at 11:15 pm and stayed up to work until 1:30 am. I didn't have a choice, it had to be done. I also didn't have a choice in not joining my friend for drinks. It was her birthday, she deserved it, and I enjoy her friendship so much that I'm willing to take time for it - lots of it.
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