Before we get started, let me say this: I have good friends. We just celebrated our fifth Friendsgiving this year, largely made up of the same people who attended the first one in 2014. There are awesome and supportive people in my life. Like Ashley, who got me a gift basket of relaxation goodies when I was preparing to undergo RAI treatment last year, and Robin, who cooked me a month’s worth of freezer meals when I was anxiously awaiting Arthur’s birth. Or the half dozen people who helped us move when I was bedridden with a bad cold. (People who help you move are real, honest-to-God friends.)
I hope that my friends don’t take this the wrong way or feel like I’m ignoring years of talking, texting, game nights, and random celebrations, but here goes: I want more. I want a specific kind of relationship.
As much as I hate to call it this, I want a “mom tribe.”
Ugh. It sounds like yuppie nonsense. Mom tribe. I’m a half-step away from buying hand-lettered plaques for my kitchen and shilling essential oils.
Until a couple months ago, I didn’t believe in mom tribes. Like the extreme cliques represented in high school movies, I thought mom tribes were marketing hype. That’s until I came across one out in the wild. There they were at a park in St. Elmo, about a dozen women all around the same age, sitting together in pairs and threesomes, chatting while their children played happily around them. They shared blankets and, I’m sure, stories. They looked relaxed, at ease, perfectly comfortable.
Honestly, it looked like an ad for breastfeeding supplements.
And it got me thinking about my own group of friends and how it’s not so much a tribe as it is a collection of people I like. I know, that’s kind of what friendship is. But what I mean is that I want to sit on a blanket at a park and feel perfectly at ease with a group of women, sharing stories and problems and joys and real life together.
Rarely has it happened in my 33 years that I’ve felt at ease around other women. That’s only gotten worse as I’ve gotten older, withdrawn from the working world outside the home, and had a child. Weird, right? When we need it most, friendship becomes more tenuous and harder to maintain. At least that’s what it feels like to me.
In light of my recent discovery that mom tribes exist and that I’d like to join or start one, I thought I’d put myself out there a bit. Cast the net, so to speak, and see what happens. So I’m just gonna put this out there. If you like it, you can take it. If you don’t, you can send it right back.
Let’s be friends.
You might think that I’m rushing things, but I’m not getting any younger. I don’t have the time or energy to forge a bond over decades of inside jokes. And anyway, as my girl Jane Austen said,
“It is not time or opportunity that is to determine intimacy; — it is disposition alone. Seven years would be insufficient to make some people acquainted with each other, and seven days are more than enough for others.” (Sense and Sensibility)
I could give you a list of my likes (tacos, true crime documentaries, Harry Potter, board games) and dislikes (wine, cleaning, almost everything to do with outside, talking on the phone). I could talk about politics (conservative) and religion (Christian) and my thoughts on current events (varied and plentiful). But I’m not going to do those things. Not here, anyway. Here, I’m going to extend an invitation to get to know me, first via virtual means, then maybe in person if there’s a connection. Consider this a weird form of online dating but for friends. Future friends.
And current friends who would help me move and cook me meals and bring me gift baskets, you’re invited, too. In fact, you’ve got first priority. We may not see each other often for practical reasons, but we could – and should – build our friendship into something more than occasional holiday get-togethers. Girls’ nights in, girls’ nights out, quick meetups for hot beverages, or picnics at the park with our offspring, you name it. I’m game.
