Motherhood and friendship make for weird bed partners.
I have friendships that predate my children with a group of women whom I meet for brunch about every 6 weeks or so. My dear K has been in my life since we were 14. I have a special friendship with the woman who was my 8th grade teacher.
And then there are lots of women I know as a result of being a mom....since our kids play together or have played together in the past. And I call them friends.
But deep down inside, I tend to be a real stickler with regard to the word friend.
I wish there was a word somewhere between friend and acquaintance. Maybe there is?
N's friendships change as often as her underwear because of preschool schedules or kids growing up or interests changing. And as a result, my "friendships" change too because I don't see these moms as often or at all. Of course, there are the handful of these "friendships" that I have inadvertently destroyed as a result of issues between the children or political/religious emails.
And whenever one of N's friendships (or my pseudo-friendships) goes sour, I feel sad but then I have to ask myself how real of friendships were they? Not that I don't really like these other moms or want to be their friend. Sometimes I really and truly wish we could become better friends beyond the confines of our children. And sometimes I realize how different we are and that we only were friendly because our kids played together. Once our kids no longer play together, we will not talk or see each other, and it really won't bother us. Heck, we may actually be glad.
I think this is one of the harder parts of motherhood. It is challenging enough to watch your child navigate the waters of true friendship and help guide him/her, but it is nearly impossible to navigate 2 ships at once. And so my friendships, or pseudo-friendships, or temporary friendships sink. Either because of the nature of being a mom or because I torpedo them myself or because they were never meant to be in the first place.
1 comment:
Oh, I so relate to this post. Andrew's playgroup needs to dissolve, because pre-school schedules are so different. But the women are so resistant...they keep trying to find a day that we can all meet...which is impossible. And I've suggested we meet once a month for game night or something just to keep in touch, but that's not enough. They want every week. And I think, huh? Our kids won't be going to the same elementary school (for the most part), so where do you see this friendship going? We're going to HAVE to either let go or move into a more "grownup" relationship where we meet without kids or on the weekends, etc. I'm so glad to see you have kind of the same attitude about these types of friends. I kind of thought I was just callous from all my moves. Turns out, I think the moving was just a different way of losing friendships. It would've happened naturally anyway. But moving is a better excuse...easier to accept and all.
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