MWF Seeking BFF (21 page)

It’s hard to believe that the search is almost half over. When I take stock of how far I’ve come, I think I’m on the right track. In the last two months I’ve loaded my social calendar with follow-up dates. Jillian, the front-runner, has been in heavy rotation. She brought her husband, Paul, and the twins along for a Sunday brunch and this time I didn’t arrive empty-handed. All it takes to endear yourself to a friend’s twin boys is Elmo, and I am not above buying a little adoration. I brought Matt along to their second birthday party—a significant step for the friendship, and not a bad form of birth control, either. Being
in charge of the boys while Jillian and Paul cut fruit was certainly entertaining for the thirty minutes we were on duty, but by the time Matt and I got back home we were more than certain that the only baby in our immediate future (read: two years if you’re asking me, more like four years if it’s up to Matt) would be our nephew, Gavin.

Hannah and I took a trip to Printer’s Row Litfest, a book fair downtown. Seeing each other once a month for book club is a good friendship booster, too. And, I swear, she has the best laugh of anyone I’ve ever met. Yes, I’m aware it sounds like I’m actually trying to date her, but have you ever thought about how vital laughter is to friendship? When I recall all the dates that went less-than-swimmingly—Heidi and Michelle, Jodie, Wendy, Dana—lack of laughter is the common denominator. If I look back at my friendships that work—Callie and Sara, my college friends, my work clique—sitting around in hysterics is the image that immediately comes to mind.

In her quest to boost her overall happiness with only small changes, Gretchen Rubin, author of
The Happiness Project
, jacked up the number of times she laughed in a day. “It’s a source of social bonding,” she wrote of the best medicine. “It helps to reduce conflicts and cushion social stress within relationships—at work, in marriage, among strangers. When people laugh together, they tend to talk and touch more and to make eye contact more frequently.” If I had to pick a single indicator of whether a friendship will take off after the first date, how many times I laughed in a given meeting would be it. It separates the front-runners from the they-were-nice-maybe-we’ll-have-dinner-agains. Just because the majority of my dates fall under the large and not-always-flattering category of “nice” doesn’t mean they’re all going to be BFFs. Shared laughter tips the scales.

Hannah and I laugh together a lot. And hers is a hearty, gulping, almost cartoonish laugh. Her laugh makes me laugh, which just makes me want to make her laugh all the time. I know, sounds like love, right?

Speaking of people who’ve made me pee myself with hysterics, my coworkers are still probably my closest friends in town. Aside from our daily lunches and link sharing (I get some combination of Neil Patrick Harris,
Glee
, and Justin Bieber videos hourly), Kari, Ashley, Lynn, Joan, and I have been making a concerted effort to meet for out-of-office gatherings. I hosted a
How I Met Your Mother
screening not so long ago, and on a recent Thursday we did drinks and tapas. I’m starting to hear talk of other jobs, but I’m feeling more confident that the friendships will exist—no, thrive—outside our corporate walls. My record at my old job was two for three—of the trio of work BFFs I was sure would be around forever, two were at my wedding two years later. But with this crowd, I’m optimistic. If we all go our separate ways, I’m rooting for a perfect score.

Margot the bridal consultant and I have had more dinners that lasted for hours. I met Amanda, the one who blogged about me, for Thai food and got an after-work pedicure with Mia, the essay responder who lives around the corner. Jen and Alison, my old NU classmates, met me for brunch, where Alison announced she got into business school (exciting!) … in D.C. (less so). My first fallen friend. Hilary and I went for that long Saturday afternoon walk, later I went to her birthday dinner, and once she even called me on the phone
just to say hi.
I was at the office and had to silence the call since cellphone talkers are shunned in the open-air cubicle environment. But I checked the voice mail immediately, obviously. “Hey, Rach, it’s Hil!” (She’s called me Rach since the first time we met. No one calls me Rach. It’s cute.) “Just wanted to say hi, see how
everything’s going. Want to make plans to hang out soon, so call me! Okay, love you!”

Really? You love me? We’ve hung out, like, four times. Here’s where I’m glad friending isn’t dating. No “talk” necessary, no drama. Just a sign that Hilary probably says I love you to all her friends, which doesn’t entirely surprise me. Not something I’d say quite so early, but harmless.

I’ve even had dinner with Jodie twice more. You know Jodie, the 40-something mother of two adolescents? The one I saw no future with? Right, her. I didn’t pursue any more dates after our first lunch, but she emailed a few times inviting me out to dinner, and I didn’t know how to say no. When it comes to friend breakups, I’m clueless. Women actually find it harder and feel more guilt when breaking up with a friend than a lover, and I’m certainly in that camp. It’s not like I can only have one friend as long as we both shall live, not as if I can’t see other people. To reject friendship, or at the very least dinner plans, with Jodie would be to say, “I don’t like you.” And that, well that’s just mean. And not true. I don’t dislike her. I just don’t imagine we’ll be best friends. So I met her for dinner, twice, and my verdict still stands. Jodie is a really nice woman who would make a wonderful friend. To someone else. We’re just not best-friend compatible.

So here we are. One date shy of the halfway mark. I can no longer whine with any conviction about having no friends—not even on my most dramatic days. I tell stories about my new pals that start “My friend Kim said …” or “I was at a bar with my friend Ellen …” I’ve started making a more concerted effort to gather phone numbers, and on a lonely Friday night I might even use them.

The definition of BFF is definitely evolving with my search. In a pinch, I have some ladies I’d call for a pedicure. But if
Matt and I had a huge fight? One that involved tears? I still wouldn’t bother any of these new friends with that. If I had a medical emergency and needed some friends to cheer me up? I’d probably call in the long-distance lifers. Hell, I’m not sure I’d ask any of these new ladies for a ride to the airport if it came down to it. So there’s a ways to go.

Even so, I try to recall the girl who started this quest. It’s as if I’m playing a movie reel in my head. I can picture her lying on the couch on a Friday night, clicker in hand. I see the morning I went for my wedding dress fitting, almost in tears because there was no one in town to come along for moral support. I can picture the “I need a friend to have lunch with” conversations with Matt—me at the kitchen table staring at my phone, him fixing a sandwich—when he was heading to play basketball for the day. I feel sorry for her. Almost embarrassed. But mostly just distant, as if she were my silly younger sister, not my former self.

It’s time to start the dirty work. As many people as I’ve met this year, my behavior over the last six months hasn’t been all that different from the last three years. Instead of proactively seeking out potential friends, I’ve waited for them to come to me. Sure, I put some feelers out—asked friends to set me up and advertised my needs more broadly—but while declaring friendlessness might have been embarrassing, it was easy. I did it from my living room, no “You look nice, will you be my friend?” required. But I can’t rely on mutual acquaintances and want ads forever. First of all, I’d like more control over who I friend-date. The online essay was great, but once I put myself out there it was in a reader’s court to decide if we’d be a good match. I said yes to anyone who would have me, to mixed results. Now I want the power to pursue the ladies I think have BFF potential.

Secondly, one thing I’ve learned thus far is that meeting people is a valuable skill, one that I’m not naturally blessed with. My friend Jenna is the best people-meeter I know. She once met a guy while crossing the street. I kid you not. He was
headed to Banana Republic and she had a Friends & Family discount coupon. She offered it to him. Turns out he was a tourist and invited her to accompany him on his shopping trip. Cut to one month later and she’s visiting him in his hometown of Toronto. (It didn’t progress much from there, but you’ve got to admit, that’s a pretty impressive pickup.)

Jenna’s remarkable ability to befriend has always served her well—socially, academically, and now in her law career. Though I can get along with almost anybody once I’ve met them, it’s the introducing myself part that’s hard. People who know me don’t believe I could get nervous around new people—“I wouldn’t exactly describe you as shy” a partner in Matt’s law firm said after I filled his ear with tales of my search—but approaching strangers is intimidating. I’ve always hated it.

I need to work on this. Networking is one of the keys to success, and maybe if I had a better handle on it I wouldn’t have found myself three years deep in a new city without a nearby best friend to speak of.

The first step toward choosing which friends to pursue is to meet all the candidates. I’ve signed up for some friend-dating websites (who knew?) and plan to attend every meet-and-greet event I can find. Social scientists say the quickest way to make new friends is to join a group or sign up for a class. Participate in something you’re interested in and you’ll find people with similar values. Plus, research shows that being a part of a group that meets just once a month will give you the same increase in happiness as doubling your salary. I’ve already got the book clubs, but perhaps I can quadruple my emotional income?

On the suggestion of that same partner at Matt’s office, I’ve enrolled in an improv class, which pretty much makes me want to crawl into a hole. You know what’s more awkward than meeting new people? Mock-raking leaves, feistily, while speaking
only in gibberish. But Mr. Partner swears it will present me with a class full of new friend prospects and train me to think on my feet when would-be pals cross my path.

After all this
doing
, I’ll weed through the new prospects and ask out the ones I think could be a match. That will at least ensure the part about me liking them. Whether they like me is a separate question.

There’s one problem with taking on all this work. I’m tired. Like, really, almost unbearably, worn out. I want to stamp my feet, plant myself on the ground with arms crossed, and whine like a five-year-old. “I don’t waaannaaa!”

Besides navigating a summer full of travel plans, I’m juggling almost two-dozen budding friendships. The only way to see everyone as often as I’d like is to double book. I’m working girl-date two-a-days—lunch
and
dinner—and while it’s exhilarating at times, mostly it’s exhausting. I enjoy my new pals, but they’re still fresh enough that I have to be “on” during our dates. Relaxing it’s not.

“I can’t do it anymore,” I tell Matt from bed one morning.

“What?”

“Make friends. I hate friends.” I hear myself, but I can’t help it. Fatigue will do that to you.

“Perk up, babe!” he shouts in his best pep talk voice. “It’s the year of the friend, can’t stop now.”

“I’m tiiiiiired.” I bury my head farther into my pillow.

“You wanted to do this. Think about Jillian!”

He’s right. I asked for this and it’s working, so there’s nothing to complain about. But there are days when I honestly feel like if I meet one more person I might break down and sabotage the whole project. Would it be too soon to burst into tears on a first date?

Take last weekend, the only one in June when I stayed in
town: I went to happy hour with Ellen on Thursday, book club Friday, and dance class with my coworkers Saturday morning. I was scheduled to meet Hilary for a street fest in the afternoon (she spaced and forgot to call. A blessing, really), and spent the evening at Matt’s friend’s barbecue. Sunday brought brunch with Hannah, a pedicure with Brynn, and dinner with Jillian. It’s a far cry from where I once was, but there are moments—like this morning—when I want to cry uncle. The glass-half-full perspective is that while this year is about connecting and being social, it’s simultaneously giving me a new appreciation for alone time. In the pre-search days, too much bonding with myself was boring at best, desperately lonely at worst. Now I covet quiet time. But I’m not feeling especially optimistic today, so instead of taking an “appreciate the new appreciation for solitude” approach, I’m hiding under the covers.

Getting out of bed would also require getting dressed. This brings us to the other downside of friend-dating, which has been spilling out of my jeans. I’ve gained ten pounds since I started this quest. Thanks so much, wine and sushi. I didn’t even know a person could expand that much in six months, though Matt claims he put on similar weight during the weekend he spent in Amsterdam junior year of college. But I’ve eaten no space cakes. I can’t blame the munchies.