Girlfriends

Have I ever mentioned that I occasionally get a friend crush? My first was on Martha Plimpton who went to my performing arts middle school (along with a lot of other famous people). Although she was a couple of years ahead of me, she was always very kind to me, which is a rare thing at that age. At one point I wrote a poem about her, and was teased relentlessly about it. It was at that point that I realized it wasn't ok to express over-the-top emotions for our friends. I still struggle with this for a variety of reasons. But I'm working on it.

Back in April when I went to D.C. I had lunch with my old mommy & me friend and came away from it positively reeling, just being reminded of how awesome she is and how much I miss her, and understanding a little better why I spiraled into a bit of a depression when she left. 

A couple of weekends ago some girlfriends and I got together to shop at the string of reproduction vintage stores in Burbank, something I never do, and I found it utterly invigorating. It made my heart sing to talk about what's going on in our dance scene, in our personal lives, feminist issues, politics, with a group of smart, thoughtful women.

Then Sunday night the BF and I went to see The Specials at the Hollywood Bowl. We were both big mod/ska people when we were young, so it was a real walk down memory lane to see this band. When there we posted about it on FB, and a friend of his who was there saw the post and called him and we went to meet them at their seats. This was his best friend from his teenaged years who he hadn't seen in 30+ years. Watching them reunite was extremely touching. They both cried and kissed and hugged each other. The BF doesn't have many friends outside of work - he's pretty much integrated himself more into my vast dance friend circle - and I think it's something he's been really missing. It was lovely watching them reminisce and express how important they had been to each other and how much they missed each other. 

With his friend and his girlfriend was another couple from the old days. The woman reminded me a lot of myself - mid-40s, two small children, tough and smart, with a somewhat wild teenaged background. She had been a skinhead girl (one of the good, non-racist ones - I always loved those girls because they were such bad asses). She and I hit it off like a house on fire. Within minutes we were telling each other our life stories and exchanging extremely deep insights about raising little kids and what the future holds for them, etc. I kind of fell in love with her a little bit. She lives in San Francisco, so as we were all saying our goodbyes, we held each others' hands and I said, "I wish you didn't live so far away!" and felt genuine anguish when I said it. She looked in my eyes and said, "you know what? This was meant to happen. I know we'll see each other again." Omg! Like, totally.

Close friendships don't come around much when you're an adult. The sheer volume of work it takes to maintain a friendship is too much for most people. When I think about the five or six women friends I consider my "close friends", the reality is we only get together maybe once every few months. Everyone lives so far away, everyone has families and intense careers and making the time to get together is just rough. We do come together for dance events, thankfully, but it makes me sad that we don't see each other more. Maybe I need to work on that. 

Or I could just stalk the woman I met at the concert on FB a little bit. Or write a poem about her. This time I won't read it in front of my class, though.