The truth is I don’t have a green thumb. Two years ago, my friend gave me a house plant and basically told me that you really have to try hard to let this plant die, ever…..….my plant died within 3 months. I showed her.
I guess there is a
point to my flower story, because how many times have flowers been compared to
relationships and friendships? Millions!
It’s true. You really have to nurture
relationships. You have to care for them
and love them and really treat them well in order for them to thrive and succeed,
just like flowers. But what happens when
you have small children and it’s hard to get places to see old friends, to make
phone calls that last hours, to take the time to keep them strong, to listen
with both ears (no distractions), to be a true friend?
I don’t have time to
miracle grow. I don’t have time to
really nurture every single relationship I have or had in the past. I want to say that it is ok, but it is
not. Not for me at least.********************************************************************
Friendships can’t
survive based off of quick 2 hour catch ups while we sip our beer or wine and
watch our kids out of the corner of our eyes.
Can they? We don’t get the nitty
gritty stuff from moments like that. They
are broken conversations; less than half of what we can give and get. We can’t dig deep. I want to know everything about all of my
friends (everything they want to tell me, at least), but how can we really keep
these friendships alive and thriving if we don’t live close? Or, can’t find the time or moments if we do
live close? I need to change that…I want
to be that true friend that I was before I had children, before I was grabbing
my 10 month old quickly (before she climbs on top of something) and giving the “one
minute” finger.
My daughter was
looking through pictures this morning.
She pointed to a picture and said, “Who’s that again, what’s her
name?” And this girl remembers EVERYTHING
and EVERYONE! It was one of my best
friends. She couldn’t even recall her
name. The thing is, we are still
extremely close but I realized that we spend a lot of time together, without
the kids. That’s ok…but then I thought
about the other part of it. My daughter couldn’t
recall her name…and that makes me sad. I want my daughter to know my “home team”
inside and out. I want her to feel
comfortable with them and it just isn’t happening right now. Things aren’t clicking like that. But I want to make them click! So, we have a big job to do. We have to take the time to nurture our old
relationships; spend the time with the people we love as families and as individuals. And, we have to spend time getting to know
new people in our town and surrounding areas.
We need to expand in every direction…both here and there….inside and
out.
My husband and I are
fairly new to the town we live in. We
didn’t even know a soul until we had children, and it is taking time trying to
build a life here. We are trying to
build relationships and find people we really click with. We want to build a life where we are because
we want to create a home base for our children.
I’m happy to know that we have friends in other towns and states. If life was perfect, we would all be in the
same place. But, it’s not. So we have to make the most of our friends
who live far away, really make the effort and get to know the people here. We have to find that balance.
We have to realize
that it is ok if we don’t click with every single person. But, as long as we are surrounding ourselves
with good people, having moments of fun and laughter, connecting;
telling stories; getting to know one another, we are lucky. We are lucky to have our old friends and
lucky to be finding new ones; lucky to be in this life, building relationships
for ourselves and our children. We will
forever be continuing to strengthen, build, and add to our “home team”I know my flowers are wilted right now. But, I’m going to water them every day.
I’m going to try and salvage them.
I’m hoping they will
be as beautiful as they were at the beginning.
I’m hoping time and
care and mostly love will perk them up and make them flourish again…
Sometimes you can just look at it as that reason/season/lifetime poem and think of people in terms of that. Where you have different friends for different reasons and at different times. Sometimes you're closer to certain people, sometimes others. Just due to life circumstances. I don't think you can be as close to everyone in your life the way you once were and sometimes it's not really that big a loss.
ReplyDeleteAll people change and grow and where it's not cool to be one of those people who only sees their purpose in life to be a parent and everything else gets chucked to the wayside. The fact is, once we marry and have kids our goals, free time, likes and dislikes, etc change. Not always for the worse.
So, yes, nurture your friendships but don't put the pressure on yourself to spread yourself so thin. You can't be all things to all people and I think you only set yourself up for failure when you try to be. It's quality time if you only see your best friend without the kids. I have a REALLY close friend who lives a mile away and I can count how many times I've seen her kids. Because we have a great relationship outside of being just "moms" and I LOVE our relationship.