Recently at dinner with
girlfriends discussing the trials and tribulations of life, we stumbled upon a
topic that happens to be near and dear to my heart...making new friends as we
age, why is it so hard?
Why is it as we get
older, we very seldom make new friends? Initially this topic struck me as odd,
because I continually join new things and meet new people all the time. But
they are not my lifelong friends with bonds that take a life time to build. And
then it dawned on me, that these new people that I meet are teammates,
colleagues, summer acquaintances, not true blue friends. So why is that?
I know that time is a
major player in this. We just don't have the time. We can hardly make the time
to socialize with the people we do know, how would we fit in the time for
someone we hardly know?
I've also noticed
with the older crowd, they plain and simple don't want any more friends. I
don't know if those words will ever leave my mouth because I love meeting new
people and learning all about them. I think I'm secretly dreaming about having
a 'G-rated, after school special' ending. Sadly I've never had a "Very
Best Friend" since childhood. I moved a lot, making it almost impossible
to keep in touch with people. I was too young to understand the meaning of
BFF's.
But as I've aged,
I've been able to (with the help of Facebook) rekindle old friendships. But
I've also realized that we need all kinds of friends for different reasons. We
need a friend who will always be our shoulder to cry on. We need a friend that
always makes us laugh. We need a friend who makes us courageous, a friend who
will tell us the truth when we need to hear it. A friend who we look up to, a
friend who brings out the best in us, a friend who when you look at her will
know exactly what you're thinking, a friend who we adore, a friend who would do
anything for us, a friend who is patient, kind, understanding and most of all
integral. After reading this list, I now know why it is so hard to make new
friends as we age...our demands are too high. (kidding)
Despite that I will continue to
make new friends, acquaintances, whatever you want to call them because in the
end, I'll just call them new found friends.
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