The Pursuit of Friendship: How to make friends as an adult

Sometimes you just need to be honest. It’s no good just letting people know when everything is okay because often, everything is not okay. I know I have hinted at it before but I have never said it properly: I’m lonely.

I don’t need hundreds of friends, I like loyal close friendships and we all know that your true friendships can be counted on one hand, and I can do that. But they live far away.

It occurred to me tonight that what I want is people near enough to just hang out with, you know, pop round for a cuppa, watch a film… you know those moments when you’re just together and you haven’t got to speak or do anything, you can just be.

To see my friends involves a calendar, a long car journey and money. This isn’t bad, of course it isn’t but it isn’t spontaneous. We catch up when we realise we have things to say and inform so all conversation builds for weeks and then expels in a day or in a couple of hours over lunch or dinner, and then it goes quiet again.

I remember my best friend at secondary school, we would talk all day about silly, teenage things and still manage to talk on the phone or email great long letters at night. There was always stuff to say because you said it as you thought of it.

I have always loved my own space and my alone time, I am great at being alone. For years this was because I was always around people and now, even though I want company, it’s not there to have therefore I can but only be alone.

A fundamental problem is that I have moved so many times, I keep moving away from a life I have temporarily made for myself and the people I meet. I move away and start again.

For many years this was because my family relocated, for the last seven years it has been me in my pursuit of my own adventures and life. But I am suffering for it or at least, I feel like I am suffering a bit for it.

I am not in the grand scale of things as my journey has always progressed forward but I feel like I am suffering because I am lonely and I can’t see a time when this will change. Well I can, it will change when I have a baby or buy a dog because they are the keys to unlocking the door to ready formed friendship groups with something in common.

I joined my hockey club last September for two reasons 1. To do something active that I remember I always loved doing at school and 2. To meet people and get some socialisation back in my life.

This is great when the season is in full swing, but its crap when it’s over because a season isn’t long enough to make friends, not the kind where you’re going to call each other up to hang out.

I’m fine with this, these things take time and a newcomer like me can’t just waltz in to ready formed groups of people and expect to just fit in, it doesn’t work like that and I am not just referring to hockey. It applies to every new place and situation.

You also can’t just force yourself onto people, you need to get acquainted and build on it. Also you’re not going to click with everybody, that’s why your true friendships can only be counted on one hand because life has already accounted for that fact.

I am not asking for sympathy, in fact I think this post makes me sound a bit pathetic, but it’s honest. It’s an honest kind of pathetic but I can’t disguise how I truly feel day to day when I claim to write a blog that is supposed to let you in.

Talking about my beauty favourites isn’t letting you in, it’s talking about things that I know we all want to read about. Its girl-talk but it’s nothing substantial; a blog is an opportunity to reach out… a key to unlocking new communities of people with things in common.

So if you’re out there, reading this and just like me, reach out and say “hey”…I’ll say it back, promise.

Friendship

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