Ignoring the Cold
Discovering the beauty of friendship.
“We should do a playdate!” The cheerful red-headed woman said brightly, cornering me at pre-school pick up. “My daughter just loves your daughter Primrose.”
I knew what she said was true because everyone loved my daughter Primrose, and Primrose loved everyone. She’s a lot like my mother in this way, genuinely interested in others and eager to know them–excited to curl into the lap of anyone who will hold her. Me? I’m more like my second born, Sierra–skeptical of others and screaming at anyone who dared touch me, except for the one that had forged my trust by housing me in their belly for 9 months.
“Sure!” I said nicely to the red-head. “That sounds great.”
I didn’t know what else to say - it just came out. Planning a playdate was the last thing I had on my agenda four years ago while I was writing my book and managing my nonprofit. I hardly even put Primrose in pre-school because of how it would affect my schedule and I scoffed when the school sent out friendly parent-teacher conference reminders. The conference was 15 minutes long and I couldn’t imagine what they needed to tell me about my kid's scissor cutting skills that was worth that much of my time.
Giving my phone number to the cheerful red-head was an automatic response that spilled from my mouth when she pulled out her phone and asked for it. We made plans to meet at the park the following week one day after school.
When I arrived at the park that early afternoon on a warm and bright September day, I was taken aback to find another mother had also been invited without the red-head saying anything to me (shouldn’t warning someone about the presence of more people be basic courtesy?). This playdate had now amassed more people than I regularly spoke to from college. My two sisters were my very best friends, and the most of who I needed, I told myself. I had also grown close with one other friend in recent years, mostly because she also managed a career and we helped each other out each week by caring for each other's kids. It was a hurried, warm, and convenient friendship.
So, meeting two mothers (TWO!) for a playdate was a huge social leap for me, and I was proud of how well I rose to the occasion. I was friendly (I think?), or at least friendly enough, because shortly after they created a group chat with one other mom and dropped my number in.
All of a sudden, I now had three friends.
It didn’t take long for me to love these women. They were each working mothers like myself wanting to spend the most time they could with their families. We’d plan playdates when we weren’t working and we’d sit around a fire together on occasion and laugh until our cheeks hurt while our husband’s put the kid’s down. They seemed to accept me too, with all my nuances, and I could feel myself expanding socially. It was comfortable and intimate, and everything I needed.
A year later, one of the three women added another name to the group out of nowhere.
A new person.
A phone number with no contact information attached. Just ten digits attached to a person I’d never met.
Four people!
I panicked. Who was this new person? How could they just suddenly be added without some sort of, I don’t know, screening process? But also, how would I manage four friendships at once? At drop off, yes, of course I can talk to four people. But in a text group? Thee text group I communicated in daily? And now there was a new watcher.
The thought of being fully myself while not offending four other people somehow seemed unlikely. Just ask my sisters; without trying, I offend them regularly. At least with them I know that they know that I mean well. I know that they’ll offer both compassion and forgiveness when my mouth says what my brain is thinking before the filter sifts out the asshole in me.
Could I expect such things from these four women? I wasn’t sure.
So, imagine my horror when the group expanded to twelve.
TWELVE.
Despite my rising unease–an urge to say nothing during group conversations and slowly drift into the periphery until I wasn’t really known at all–I stayed. I joined the conversations. I forced myself to. The three women that pulled me into their circle two years prior were the sole motivation for continuing on this ridiculous and germinating friendship journey. I grew to need them. Not in the transactional way I needed others outside of my family. But rather, socially. With no other purpose than for the community that was created among us. Like family. I loved who they were–lovely and imperfect. And I loved who I was while I was with them–someone social and accepting of both them and myself–someone who might even go to the bathroom in a group if one of them had asked me to. Maybe if I didn’t say exactly what came to my mind all the time, this mosh of women wouldn’t throw me out.
And they haven’t, yet (please don’t).
Being part of this group has brought more joy and growth than I ever could have expected. I encourage myself daily to be fully myself with them, and to fully accept who they are as well. This is an act of both love and compassion for myself and for them. They aren’t perfect, and neither am I. I’ve learned that hiding my imperfections doesn’t make the imperfections go away, it just makes me distant.
Self-reliance is something I’ve prided myself with my whole life, wearing its shell like a beloved winter coat keeping me warm. Now I can’t help but wonder, thanks to these women, is it keeping me warm, or just teaching me to ignore the cold?