Monday, April 30, 2012

Moms and friends

Hello anybody.  I know its been a very long time since I posted.  Life has been busy.  Of course.

 So first is the update: We have a small science related play space now, supported for six months rent and overhead by a local foundation- Yay.  As director, I'm the main volunteer 2.5 days a week.  We now have a board- very exciting- we had our first meeting this week.

I've been sick since about February, two really evil cold/flu things in a row. I'm still coughing a bit, but I feel a lot better this week.  Consequently I tapered off my gym time to nothing a few weeks ago when my ribs hurt too much from coughing to get anything done.

And this weekend I guess I over did the gardening, now my arms hurt again.  I've gone on a course of naxoproxine (Aleve).  Maybe then my ribs will feel recovered and I'll get back to the gym... after our trip to CA next month.

OK, on the the post.  Its an issue I've noticed before, but I've really got some questions about what to do about it.  Yes this is rambling, but thats how you get the thoughts out sometimes.

There are a lot of people like me around here, it turns out.  The more I get to know various moms who visit our spot and moms from the moms group, the more I want to work more on this problem.  So what is the problem?  I thought it was just me... sort of an inability to make new friends.  I don't mean new acquaintances- I have a lot of them now through the moms group and my project.   Some of them I even see pretty often.  And I realize the moms group is intended to work on this issue- and it does, we do meet each other, and see each other on a somewhat regular basis; we do confide in each other to some extent.  But for many of us, the next level is missing.  The level of friendship where you actually see each other OUTSIDE of organized activities, where you actually schedule play dates with their children or get the two families together.  My son doesn't have a "friend" outside of play care that he sees on some regular basis. The friendship where you call each other up, email, drop and visit, plan something at the last minute, where you don' to worry about over staying or what they might think of your small messy house.  Friends that when you do visit you cannot stop chatting and stay up way past when you meant to.  Friends that when you say, I'm visiting town this day, they make time to see you and you know you are not imposing.

We have friends like this from our previous lives.  Why is this relationship so hard to obtain locally? Or is it a stage in life?  I ask this about stage in life because, for me it seems like my spouse is so busy and caught up in work that he doesn't have time to be part of a social life or isn't interested or doesn't care... I don't know.  So why can't I just be social on my own?  Honestly, its just not the same.  I don't know if other women have similar spouse issues, in fact, I don't think so, but still they seem to be looking for companionship- and many are as introverted as I am.   I'm speaking of stay at home moms mostly.

 It seems like families where two parents work just have no time for socializing- I can't imagine that we would.  But I do know one family where both parents work that seems to socialize a lot more than we do.  I don't understand how they make time to do it.  Actually I know many families that seem to be more sociable with others- but they seem to relish travel more than we have the energy for-these families seem to go out of town either to visit friends or relatives quite often- like more than once a month.  Of course this cuts down on local friendships I imagine.

Another thing I have in common with many of these moms is a lack of local relatives for day care... or even a regular babysitter.  If you move here from elsewhere as many of these moms have, the family is somewhere else. A babysitter...well where do you find somebody you trust?  And how can you afford to pay them for their time if you are not working?  Some of us, myself included, are opposed to paying them a pittance to take care of our children- we think their time is worth something.  It seems we are not the only ones too lame to find somebody and don't have the grandparents, aunts, etc to just drop them off here and there. (Yes, I thought it was just us before I heard others complaining about this.)  I think we need to set up a system for foster grandparents/uncles/aunts/relatives- I'm sure there are people out there who might like some extra kids/relatives in their lives?...But how do you find them and get a relationship going?

My point... there is no point, but the moms2moms group, and I hope my project, bring people like us together... but how do we go from group friend to REAL FRIEND.  Is it something an organization can help with?, something we can learn?, how do we do it? Do we just have to be more motivated and try harder? What would it take to turn my circle of friends I see frequently to real friends you can leave your children with, drop in on, share meals with?  Or is it just that I haven't met the right friend yet? And all these other women ALSO haven't met the right friend yet?

I really would like some comments here!


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