I might be that desperate now

Making friends as an adult is a lot like dating.  You have initial contact like say at a playgroup. Chemistry is either there or it isn't.  If the chemistry isn't there you chat politely for the duration of your time together and then you move on.  If it is there you make plans to see them again, to meet up at the next playdate. After a few playdates of animated conversation you exchange contact info.  You go home and add them as a friend on Facebook and wonder when is too soon to call.  You call and make plans to get together outside of the playgroup and you end up talking on the phone for hours.  You finally get together, it goes well and you go home wondering again how soon is too soon to call.  Eventually, after a few pauses and awkward moments, you settle into a rhythm and time passes and suddenly you realize you know all each others stories; you know about their old boyfriends, you've met their family, you have a million shared memories of conversations and adventures, you have inside jokes.  You have moved from girlcrush to casual friends to committed soul sisters.

I have been fortunate enough in my life to have made these kinds of friends not only as a teenager but again as an adult.  When we moved here four years ago and I was feeling the loneliness of our new beginning my mom suggested I put an ad in the paper.  Thankfully I met Heidi sometime shortly after that and didn't have to resort to such desperate measures.  Heidi and I instantly "clicked".  Right from our very first conversation I felt like I had known her all my life.  In addition to being fun and spontaneous and a free spirit of the best kind she is deep and heartfelt in her approach to life and parenting.  She also happens to have twins who are exactly the same age as mine and for the past two years we have lived just around the corner from each other.  We have spent countless hours around her kitchen table or my kitchen island drinking cold tea or Italian sodas while our brood played merrily away.  Neither of us have family here and we became each others family.  We watched each others kids for dentist appointments and date nights, and our kids slept over at Heidi's the night before we moved across town.

I have another friend and our kids have gone to the same preschool for the past three years.  We have spent the past two years having coffee together every Tuesday morning.  She picked me up from the hospital after my appendix incident and made me meals and took my kids to preschool for me while I was recovering.  In addition to Tuesday coffees she has been my standing movie date.

In December Heidi moved away and in February Sandi moved away.  It all happened very quickly and I was devastated at losing my two "go-to" people in the friends-with-young-kids category.  I have been lonely since they left.  I do have other other friends, people I can call for playdates or if I want a girls night out, it's just that none of those friends has the same depth or ease that I had with Heidi and Sandi; both of which are the products of time.  Unfortunately time is one thing there is no shortcut for. 

Not too long ago Tristan was very sad.  He had felt left out during a playdate and kept sniffing while telling me about all his sadness.  I tried cheering him up by reminding him about other friends who always wanted to play with him.  "But they moved away and we never get to see them," was his response.  I reminded him how great it is to always have a built-in playmate in his twin sister. "But she didn't want to play with me today," was his response.  I reminded him that Ava wanted to ride bikes with him that afternoon.  They had just learned to ride on two wheels and I asked him if he was excited about riding his two-wheeler.  "No," he said with his arms crossed over his chest. "I'm just going to ride my tricycle."

It's a grey, rainy day (again) here today and since making a spontaneous trip to visit Heidi last Friday, I miss her even more.  I should be drinking tea with her and eating warm cookies or scones in an oven-warmed kitchen while we spend our afternoon chatting away.   But I'm not.  I'm at my kitchen island alone drinking tepid tea in a sweatshirt and jeans (in June!) and writing about how lonely I feel. I recently connected with a woman and there is great chemistry there and I really feel the potential for a heart friend but today all the time that is required to get from here to to there feels tiring and I just want her to already know all my stories and I just want us to already be past the getting-to-know-you phase and into the I-can-call-and-invite-myself-over place.  I should probably give myself a little pep-talk and remind myself of how great my life really is and how full my heart is with friendships, but I won't.  It's wet and cold out and I'm in a funk.  I don't want to be cheered up.  I just want to ride my tricycle.