Tag: friendship

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Today in Learning How To People: Cheese

I was invited to board games tonight, and asked if I could bring anything. The host says “I usually have some hard cheeses out for people!”

Being a Very Neurotypical Person who is Very Good At Reading The Room, I interpreted this to mean “Please bring some cheese.”

Mmmm nope! In this case, it meant “We already have cheese, so go ahead and bring something that you, Dairy Allergy Person, can eat.” Doh!

Anyway, that’s why I usually always get clarification/specify what people are saying/asking. It’s not safe to assume! 😂 🧀

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On groups and dyads

A variety of painful circumstances in my life recently have crystallized out a thought, for me: as much as we want a Group to be a cohesive unit, the group is only as strong as the strength of its various dyadic friendships.

When a group that had been constructed around one central Hub Person implodes, the continuance of the group is dependent on whether any of the Spoke People had actually formed individual (“dyadic”) friendships with each other. Without those interconnected friendships, the group would wither away without its Hub. (And maybe that’s why some Hubs feel threatened when they’re no longer the gatekeepers of access to the other friends?)

And when a large enough group (40 or so people) forms, not everyone will be as close to everyone else in that group; so it’s up to the individuals to build (or not build) their friendships with one another. If one person is having a crisis and reaches out, I am finding that sometimes, a larger group is *less* likely to respond. It’s the small six person chats that get things done for each other; or it’s an existing dyadic friendship within the larger circle that recognizes the need and answers it.

Is this the Bystander Effect in action? Are the larger groups prone to feeling too helpless to help? Someone else will do it?

Is this an effect of geography? Some of my Discords are pretty geographically dispersed, and I think that makes it harder (though not impossible) to build those sturdier connections.

It can also be hard to know what/how someone needs help. With closer individual bonds, there’s more of a chance that the person helping will actually help, versus accidentally making things worse. (I know that’s a thing for me as well: I’ve made things worse so often.)

But I just had an absolutely terrible week, and all kinds of people came to my rescue; and I am so grateful. And I witnessed someone else leave a group because they weren’t getting the support they needed, and my heart aches for them; but we were never directly close with each other, either, so I felt too distant (geographically and emotionally) to help. So it goes.

But anyway, my point in all this rambling is: If you are in a large friend group, make sure you aren’t neglecting the individual connections with individual people. In the end, “The Group” is a legal fiction. The people that help you move are the real individual humans that you can bond with, or not, as life takes you.

But try to take care of each other. Yes, The Village is built on unpaid labor. It’s transactional even though it’s not tracked, or shouldn’t be tracked, because Village Support is about having help with specific concrete actions that need doing.

I don’t know. I’m rambling and tired. But just. Look for the helpers; and be the helpers, when you can.

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Everybody wants a village, but nobody wants to put in the work

I think this is going to be a macro post, where I come back and add things as they occur to me.

This Slate column

My friend recently linked me to this, and man I got nothing. Just read it.

https://slate.com/life/2024/11/parenting-advice-friends-loneliness-village.html

These comics

I just got a Bluesky account and already the algorithm knows me.

https://bsky.app/profile/pervis.bsky.social/post/3lbqarh4u7k2p

https://bsky.app/profile/spookyforcefrancis.bsky.social/post/3lbshvyhf422b

Some thoughts

If you want people to show up for you, you have to show up for them. Modulo disability, being physically present really really matters. I can’t help my friend move but I helped her pack and purge and can store some of her stuff. I’ve babysat for friends without pay, including overnights, because that’s what friends do when they’re able. And when I was very sick last year, my people showed up for me.

I tolerate a lot of things in my life. I recognize that we can’t always build a village out of picture perfect people that we’ve cultivated like Sims, just like that columnist says. I’ve always been afraid to get close to my neighbors, because what if they’re awful? I’m stuck with them. But: maybe if we get close, they won’t be awful. Or maybe they were never awful to begin with.

For now: I’m just grateful for the friends I do have. Thank you for being with me.

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The better part of valor

Something I’ve had to learn over the years of being on the Internet is that sometimes I am wrong, and need to take a seat and be introspective instead of explaining why I think the way I do.

This was surprisingly difficult to do. I think part of it is the desire to not have people dislike me; but both learning that that’s not something I can control, and starting to care less if they DO like me, makes me better at figuring out what I did wrong and being a better person in the future, which (counter intuitively?) makes me more likeable as a person.

We all fuck up on occasion. (Or, even, frequently.)

We all have the ability to say “Sorry, will do” when a mod tells us to step off or take a break.

I like to joke that I learned How To People by reading a book. But that’s not so far from the truth. Thinking about things and analyzing social situations is how I managed to get social skills in the first place.

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Online spaces are not real spaces

I recently took a weeklong hiatus from Facebook – not on purpose, just because I was very busy with things going on in my life, and didn’t have time to log in and share some memes.

While I was gone, a very anodyne post that I shared exploded. I was generally aware that “there was some drama,” but I was unaware of the fact that people were, apparently, calling out to me within the comments of the post. (I do not keep Facebook on my phone for balance/mental health reasons. Life/life balance? It’s not work/life balance, it’s just that I find Facebook distracting, and I try to limit my distractions whenever possible.)

Today I’m checking back in on things, and reflecting: should I have been there to monitor the post?

I have a friend who considers his online space (that he controls and moderates) to be an extension of his living room: that it is for people who he invites in, of his own volition, and he expects them to behave as though they *are* in his living room, conversing with people they know to be his personal friends, with all the assumption of noble intent that would go along with such an interaction.

Not all of us keep such a tight leash on our Internet communities. My Facebook is almost entirely private, and while I do occasionally befriend people who are “one hop” away from me (and have made good friends by doing so), in general, I try to keep the posts to people I do, in fact, know, and generally get along with.

This has landed me in hot water more times than I can count; in part, because I can get along with many different types of people. Not everyone; I have my lines. I have unfriended or blocked a handful of folks over the years, and I could probably tell you exactly why for each one. (If I knew how to do spoilers on WordPress, I would give the examples right here.)

This is, in a sense, an extension of Geek Social Fallacy #4: Friendship Is Transitive. The people that I am friends with are not always going to get along with one another; and that goes double if I am not there to moderate the tension. But here’s the thing: I don’t live on Facebook. Facebook is not real life. I cannot moderate it all the time; I’m not hosting a 24/7 living room party in my house. And I think that fact extends to situations in which I refrain from logging in, even for extended periods. My real life will always take precedence over Facebook. (Even if real life does involve some level of farting around on my phone on DIFFERENT social networks.)

So, while I do feel bad that the conversation spiraled without me…I am realizing that I don’t feel responsible for it, if that makes sense. I would say “sorry,” but it would be the “sorry” of Condolence, not of Apology.

I figure I will continue on as I have begun: by using Facebook sporadically, and not trying to check it more often just because people might have driven a thread off a cliff. (Especially since on a platform like Facebook, I have no moderation power beyond just deleting the entire thing.)

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Best friends

I’ve had best friends before.

One, or six, or fourteen at a time?

At this stage in my life, I think the whole concept of a best friend is children play-acting at monogamous marriage before they’re ready or interested in a romantic relationship with anyone.

I still remember the agonizing feelings I had when someone else got to be The Best Friend when I wanted to be.

And I remember the guilt I felt when I drifted apart from my closest friend of childhood. Was I, somehow, divorcing her?

I’ve had “friend breakup” talks, as an adult. They were painful, but a necessary part of being compassionate to someone you once (and still) care(d) about.

One of my friends in college told me, “Best Friends isn’t a single job; it’s a tier.” I didn’t believe her then. I do now. (And her husband is the person I’d pick if I was forced to pick a single best friend, which is an amusing bonus anecdote.) For the most part, I don’t have a single best friend; I have a rotating cast of friends who are all close to me in different ways. One friend is my local emergency contact for everything. The other (aforementioned) is my advance directive POA. Yet another pair are the designated guardians for my child in case both my ex husband and I pass away.

A friend today shared a post about how “best friend” is a term that imitates monogamy, and it made me think about all this. (I don’t have the link handy, but I’ll add it when I do.) It’s been percolating in my mind for a while, but I haven’t really put it into words.

It’s not realistic to expect one person to be all those friends for you; different people are different, and every dyadic friendship has its own shape. They don’t take away from each other, except inasmuch as time and energy are limited things.

I am grateful, though, for all the friends that I do have, and for all the friends I used to have. You have all touched, shaped, my life in one way or another.

I’m glad that I don’t have to pick one friend to be a Best Friend.

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Friendships and Relationships

Years ago, I read this essay on the Atlantic about people who overtly prioritize their platonic friendships over their romantic partnerships.

I no longer have access to read it, but it was in my browser tabs, and I still think about it occasionally.

As a person who is intentionally solo (no cohabitant) at this stage of my life, I’m trying to mainly strengthen my friendships; even if some of those are also romantic or sexual, my overarching goal is to just build up my connections with the people who are in my life. And I don’t need to be fucking them, or living with them, to do that.

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Nuclear event planning

One of the ways that I try to plan gatherings with my friends is a style I’ve taken to calling “nuclear” in my head: basically, you create a solid nucleus of reliable people who are able and willing to commit to attending the event, so you know it’s gonna happen regardless; and then, from there, you can slowly expand your guest list with people who might have more going on in their lives, or whatever, that makes them more of an Uncollapsed Social Waveform. (They’re your electrons.)

If the event involves accomodations, you can pick a specific date with your nucleus (perhaps via a Doodle poll or similar), and then pick a general geographic range before telling your electrons the plans. Have a firm RSVP deadline so you can book your lodging before the event itself! Alternatively, if you’re not wedded to the idea of renting one house together, you can just all get hotel rooms individually.