All posts tagged: Friendship

Calling Julie: The Sister I Chose and Lost

By Jody Jones

I still have her listed as “sister” on my Facebook. You know how you can tag people as family in your profile? It has been five years since she died, and I just can’t bring myself to change it. Perhaps I never will. Julie was my best friend. We first met each other when we were working at The Destin Log on the northwest coast of Florida. It was my first “real job” out of college. I had followed a cute Air Force officer to the beach town after I got out of school, planning to move on to Atlanta after the summer. Turns out I loved it there and, although the dude didn’t love me, I stayed. I had a friend who knew someone at the local paper, and — voila — I got a job there on the lowest rung, working the government beat in nearby South Walton County. Julie was the features editor — a beautiful woman who drove a cute red BMW. I was drawn to her immediately. Now, the government …

BFF Love Fest: 7 Pairs of Besties Share What Bonds Them

By Laurie White

I met my friend Sarah eight years ago at a conference after-party, years after I thought the world had stopped handing out best friends to grown women. I shut my hand in a heavy restroom door and cut it — badly. She was walking in when the bleeding started and asked me if I needed help. I said yes, and she stayed to assess the situation. We wrapped it up, laughed about it and went back to the table. I don’t remember what happened next, but I know that she has been there, in many ways and to varying degrees, ever since. We all need these kinds of connections: strong, supportive bonds that are key to health, happiness — and also killer brunch and housewarming parties, let’s be honest. Sometimes, a particular human connection is stronger than the rest, and you end up with that person who holds the other side of your virtual heart necklace…and maybe even your internet passwords. You get a best friend. We talked with some pairs of best friends about …

Ghosted and Gone: I May Never Know Why She Left

By Stacy Morrison

Let’s call her Jane. Out of respect for her feelings. Even though I haven’t spoken to her in several years, even though it has been almost seven years since we stopped being best friends. Well, I thought we were best friends. Was I wrong? Maybe. We met when we were both editorial assistants at a chic, smart women’s magazine. Obviously, we were both thrilled to be there. She was Ivy League Official, though. I felt intimidated by her legit status. At first, I didn’t like her. I’m sure it was some kind of competitive pheromone exchange that made me instantly bristle and want to turn away from her. But she would pop over from her aisle to mine, plopping down in my visitor chair to chat with me and the other assistant across the aisle. I remember that I always made her laugh, which warmed me up to her. I remember that she was really smart. And wore way too much brown for my taste. I remember a few months later when I told her …

Ovarian Rhapsody: A Thank You Note

By Margit Detweiler

Back in January, just before I’d started chemotherapy, I’d been talking to my friend Adrianna about cold caps, the beanie of ice that sits atop your head and (hopefully) prevents your hair from falling out during treatment. Expensive and painful, I wasn’t too sure it was for me, but this was the stage when I was researching, frantically Googling and considering anything and everything. I had no idea what I was in for. Via email, Adrianna introduced me to her friend Casey, who had worn the cap and preserved most of her hair during a second bout with cancer. Only five minutes after I’d emailed Casey, I had a response. “Margit. I wanna come over asap. When works?” And two days later, there she was, sitting on my couch, counseling me — a beautiful, earthy soul with colorful bracelets and talismans about her neck and wrists, moving gingerly, still recovering from recent treatment. Her hair was thin, but there it was. She handed me a pretty cloth bag filled with sugar-free gum, savory Kind bars, …

Me & Jo: When a Friendship Breaks Apart

By Tina Rowley

(Photo: Nancy Gonzalez/TueNight) We met when we were in our late 20s, acting in a play together. On breaks from rehearsal, Jo used to scoop me up in a fireman’s carry and walk me around the room, yelling, “WHY, GOD! WHY DID YOU TAKE HER!?” while I went limp and pretended to be dead. The first time I hung out at Jo’s apartment was around Christmas, where we bonded over our insane love for the holiday while basking in the glow of her tree. Our friendship deepened and I felt free enough to bring up a small incident that had bothered me, something reasonable Jo had said, but at the wrong place and the wrong time. There was something about Jo’s being that made me feel that it was safe to be honest with her about it, and she listened receptively to what I had to say. A new level of trust bloomed in me in that moment: trust in her and trust in myself. It was a giant gift, and I heard from a …

What’s That On Your Head? A Wig

By Margit Detweiler

(Photo: Courtesy Margit Detweiler, Graphic: Nancy Gonzalez/TueNight ) “By the way, I have a new wig. I don’t think the reddish one will survive another concert.” Shelly called me to plan our get-ups for the next B-52s concert next Sunday night. “It’s a bob but I can tease it, cause it’s gotta be big. It can not be half-assed. It has to be awesome.” Since 1977 you could probably catch The B-52s playing somewhere in America. In the last decade or so they’ve been touring almost every year. I know, because Shelly and I go, almost every year. But when did we first put on the wigs? It’s difficult to say. In the beginning, we would fashion our real hair into sky-high beehives. She was Cindy. I was Kate. Always. I’d tease the hell out of my thick brown hair with a rat-tail comb, Shelly found either a cardboard toilet paper roll or a Styrofoam cone that she’d twirl her blonde hair around and up. One of my dearest friends, Shelly and I both of hail …

Letters TueNight Margit Detweiler

People Used to Write Letters! And I Have a Box to Prove It

By Margit Detweiler

(Photo: Courtesy Margit Detweiler/TueNight) I have a green box. It is filled with dusty old letters, organized by names and folders. Ex beaus. Lost friends. Professors who kept in touch with me after college. Grandparents. I haven’t looked at this box in probably 20 years. I mean, I’ve seen it sitting way back in my closet, every time I shuffle shoes around. I’ve used it as a sticker repository it over the years (Black Flag! AOL! Obama! Biden ’08!). And it remains. I know it’s there. But I never open it. Too much old emotional artifact bound to swallow hours of my life. Who has time? For some reason, this year, I went excavating. I dared to have a peek. Inspired, perhaps, by my parents who have been downsizing and doling out old letters, photos, diaries, books, and matchbook collections to us kids. While going through that old stuff you unearth buried treasures, and, of course, a few rusty nails. I’d imagine my own shoeboxes of unorganized, dog-eared letters disintegrating, and that over a century …

6 Cool, Handmade Gifts For Your Bestie

By Shira Mizel

This past week we’ve been celebrating our very best buds — the people who will lend a hand, an ear, or that long-coveted halter top. If you want to surprise your gal pals with unique gift options, our BFF collection on GREAT.LY is just the ticket. We’ve gathered handmade goods by artists dedicated to finding the beauty in the everyday.     Simple Dot Necklace Peggy Li is a San Francisco-based artist whose jewelry line is both feminine and whimsical. We love this simple, tasteful dot necklace. Surprise your pal with this elegant, everyday bauble (and buy yourself a matching one while you’re at it).   Hello Friend Tote Bag Why, hello friend. Here’s an easy, breezy tote bag your bestie can lug anywhere. Reasonably priced and adorable, these bags and other printed goodies are made by New Zealand’s Liora Saad and her company Toodles Noodles. She describes her items as “colorful and cheeky” and we’re inclined to nod our heads.   March — Original Mixed Media LA-based artist and illustrator Shelley Kommers describes her artwork as “collage-based, textured, and …

11 + 1: How I’ve Kept the Same Group of Pals Since Preschool

By Lauren Young

(Photo courtesy Lauren Young) Most women I know have drifted away from their childhood friends. Not me. My childhood friends are my partners in crime, my trusted advisers and an eternal source of laughter in my life. Remember the Pink Ladies in the movie Grease? Well, my group of girls has a name, too: We call ourselves 11 + 1. (We don’t have pink satin jackets, though.) Some of these friendships formed as early as preschool, and one was cemented as late as high school (she’s the +1). But this group of a dozen women fused together and we all love each other like sisters. We live in three different time zones — and eight different cities — so getting everyone together (with 25 kids among us!) is nearly impossible. Instead, we gather at the virtual water cooler known as Facebook, where we can share life’s joys, including a baby’s first steps, family trips, college acceptances, and, most recently, the birth of twins via a surrogate. We’ve also encountered plenty of the heavy stuff, too: …

Can We Still Make Best Friends After 40? Hell Yeah

By Stacy Morrison

Stacy spends some downtime with her friend and fellow blogger (as well as TueNight contributor), Heather Barmore. (Photo courtesy Stacy Morrison) In the past few years, I’ve flown past quite a few milestones, ages by which such-and-such and so-and-so would supposedly happen. I can handle the thinning eyebrows, the slower metabolism, the death of my fertility. But did I hit my sexual peak at 35 and start an inevitable decline? Umm, no. Definitely not, is all I’ll say here. And the old trope that it’s impossible to make “true” friends after 40? To that I say “bullshit.” I would need another hand or three in order to count out the truly deep and meaningful friend connections I’ve made in the past five years. And that’s not because I think I have some kind of black belt in awesome-friendness. But it’s because, for me, friendships changed from being situational to being intentional. I wasn’t spending my friend capital on people who just happened to be around me — say, parents of my son’s friends — but …

On Being the Friend Who Doesn’t Like Friends

By Heather Barmore

Enjoying alone time. (Photo credit: Shutterstock) I am the introvert. The recluse. The one recently described by friends and family as a “hermit.” “Maybe you should leave the house?” said a friend gently. I could sense the concern, even over her text message. “I just have so much to do,” I lie. I do this a lot — the lying. And here I am now telling you all of my secrets in case you, too, have a friend that requires a bit of prodding. For the record, I’m not exactly terrified of people, though I had to chuckle when I read this quote via blogger Luvvie Ajayi: “I was a people person until I met people”. I just don’t particularly like leaving my house and interacting with the outside world. I pride myself on being able to go entire weekends without speaking to another human being. Enthusiastically, I eventually tell others about my 72 hours without actual conversation: “And then I went for a run — ALONE. And I did some writing —ALONE. The only …

Real-Time BFF: A Blissful, 20-Something Bond

By Shira Mizel

Best Friends Forever (Photo courtesy Shira Mizel) I met Emma during a pop raid at a Wisconsin girls camp. Camouflaged in black, we crept stealthily toward the vending machines. I don’t remember what movie line I whispered, but it prompted Emma to ask shyly, “Isn’t that from Garden State?” Instant connection. We talked for hours that night on a tiny twin bed. I admired her bottomless cheer, compassion, artistic skills, cheekbones, and spot-on impressions. We were attached at the hip for the next three summers. The staff referred to us as “Shira n’ Emma.” They commissioned our antics to write songs and emcee talent shows and didn’t question our schedules when we attended every activity together. Emma played with the worms as I fished. She laid on the tennis court as I practiced my backhand and whenever a ball hit her, she said, “thank you, may I have another” to no one in particular. In the arts and crafts building, I haphazardly slid beads onto string as Emma made intricate lanyards and stunning paintings. Saying …

Front to Backlist

Buried in the Sand: 3 Novels Explore Fraught Friendships

By Bethanne Patrick

(Photo: TueNight) In Front-to-Backlist, we take one or more present-day titles (sometimes bestsellers/buzzed about, sometimes not) and tell you why they’re terrific — then share another book from the past that you might enjoy too. There are so many angles to friendship, which really means there are so many sharp places on which to injure one’s self. Good friendships, from the kind that are purely fun and superficial to the deep, lifelong ones, feed us and help us to grow, while bad friendships, including nasty frenemies and toxic hangers on, can lead us to the brink of madness. Emily Gould’s new novel, Friendship, talks about the stuff of modern friendships. Thirty-something besties Bev and Amy have seen each other through some tough times, but are now in such different places they might not recognize each other’s Instagram feeds. Referring to a social-media site is deliberate, of course; much of former blogger (Gawker, etc.) Gould’s life has been lived out loud online. While this book shows her still yakking (there are many thinly veiled references to …

Margit’s Note: Will You Be Mine?

By Margit Detweiler

Hello Friend. I miss you. We were attached at the hip for over a decade. You were my “plus one” at rock shows. I learned to love camping (even if I just couldn’t get with the rainbow hacky sacks). You had a kid, I didn’t. I stayed in the city, you moved to the ‘burbs. “Remember that time your cat projectile vomited on that guy who stayed over?” It still cracks me up. I see you every day over on FacePlace. But I haven’t talked to you in six months. Still, I know you’ll be there, and I’ll be here, after everyone else has left the party. This week we take a minute to celebrate our BFFs — the women who we’ll always be latched to, who own a large part of us, even if we’ve drifted away from each other and into our own little lives. This week on TueNight: Lauren Young shares the lifelong crew of 12 friends she’s maintained since preschool. Stacy Morrison is still making best friends in her 40s. Go figure. …

In the Middle of the Night: Two Friends, Two Babies, Two Phones

By Christina Chang

(Graphic: Kat Borosky/TueNight.com) Christina and I had babies two days apart, and we went through the exact same thing at the exact same time. Even when babies are a just month apart, there are already variances—especially when they are newborns. There is not a shared sensitivity of what is happening right now. Christina shared everything I was feeling, especially in the wee hours of the night.   I don’t think anyone ever impressed upon me just how lonely and long nights can be when you’re the only one up, nursing and bouncing and rocking your fussy, lovely, crying, wonderful baby back down. When most of the world was sleeping and our men were snoring beside us, Christina and I had our babies in one hand and our iPhones in the other. And because we were bent on breastfeeding on demand in the beginning, this meant we were up 2-3 times a night. l was so bleary eyed, crazy tired, falling asleep while sitting up in bed holding on to my blob of a newborn. I am not sure how it …