where do people find friends if they 1) don't play ultimate and 2) don't go to church?
ok, i lied, a second question:
is it a unique expectation of our generation to have friends? i mean, everyone wants to fit in, but does it seem like we have this special need for people with whom we can share ourselves more platonically and more honestly? is this an expectation set up by sitcoms like friends and sex and the city? that we'll have ppl we can sit around with in coffee shops and talk about deep issues or nothing at all? that these ppl will not only tolerate but love our shortcomings?
it seems to me, that in our parents' generation, love was the holy grail of relationships. people expected to have a terrific first kiss, a terrific first time, a terrific, loving husband/wife. our generation is more jaded about love...we know it doesn't always work out, that a lot of ppl end up settling or divorcing or whatever. relationships require work, and we're ok with that. but we don't expect friendships to require work. we expect to have great times naturally and easily. after all, it was easy as kids right? your best friend was the kid you saw the most (unless that kid beat you up or something). but wherever you lived, you found someone to hang out with...even if you didn't like that person very much, as long as they could pitch a baseball and swing a bat (my requirements). plus, i guess most kids don't have the strongest personalities anyways, so not much to clash with...all my memories of childhood friends are of things they DID not things that they THOUGHT. and in a school full of freaks, chances are there's someone freakier than you willing to tolerate you, right?
but as "adults" there are so many more layers to peal thru...not to mention the lack of a forum where you can meet ppl. is that why so many of us go binge drinking till who knows when? or why ppl generally spend months feeling lonely when they move to a new city (barring ulty players and churchgoers of course)? i've had a couple of conversations with a couple of nonulty and nonreligious ppl about this recently...i mean, not deep conversations, just about them feeling lonely and not knowing where to find enduring friendships...i guess i've just been really lucky. thank god for ultimate.
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I don't think friendships generally require nearly as much work as relationships. Friends are great because you don't HAVE to bring all of your junk to the table, you can just show up for the fun parts and usually that's okay. All you really need in order to be friends with someone is a common interest. You don't really have to bring in the rest of the crap in your life.
Relationships are harder because they have the fun parts AND the junk, and your junk has to complement your partner's junk, otherwise you just end up with a landfill, and no one really knows what to do with all the methane it's producing.
I think our generation doesn't really have enough time for relationships, or for making new friends. We have time for already-made-friends though, because they require like half the energy expenditure as a relationship. You still have to devote extra time and energy for major drama, like breakups and deaths and depression and stuff like that, but you still don't have to go home to their dirty laundry every day (relationship), and you also don't need to devote a lot of energy to learning their back story (new friend).
I think the lack of a forum is the much bigger problem for making adult friends. I have no idea how to meet people outside of ultimate. Bars are sketchy. Facebook is sketchy. Libraries are not conducive to holding a conversation. Coworkers are hit or miss. Maybe by volunteering? Volunteering is sort of like church for atheists.
This is the longest comment ever.
yeah, i was thinking if i didn't play ultimate, maybe i'd join a knitting circle or something (maybe a gastronomy class?)...and maybe i could give the knitted wear/food to charity? is that kinda like volunteering?
i always thought that ultimate was like church for atheists (plus daphne).
when you talked about your junk and your partner's junk, i couldn't help thinking about female and male parts of plugs...
for me, the hard part about meeting new ppl at parties is CARING. i generally don't have the patience to dig past the introductory crap to get to the interesting part of them (but ppl i meet at ulty parties tend to be almost instantaneously interesting...maybe b/c we're all weird and less worried about being polite). i know that's pretty pompous of me, but i also kinda feel like i don't need another pseudo friend when i have so many great friends...
It seems that as I get older, I am less and less enthusiastic about meeting new people. It's just tiring now to make small talk with people that I most likely won't have much of a connection with beyond the superficial. And as I get older, that's what I seem to want -- more of a relationship with people rather than small talk. I miss my friends and wish that I could see them more than a few times a year.
i guess i'm just lucky i get both :-P
ya know, that's one of the first questions people from the states asked us this weekend, "do you guys have friends in hong kong?" no, actually we're huge rejects who hate socializing with other satient beings, thanks for asking!
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