MWF Seeking BFF

by Rachel Bertsche

  Earlier this week I received an unexpected Facebook message.

  Hey Rachel,

  Long time no see. I’m going to be in Chicago on Sunday and Monday nights and thought I’d drop you a note to see if you’re interested in getting a drink and reliving the summer of many moons ago. Let me know.

  —Nick

  Facebook is an interesting beast. It’s old news that it has completely changed the way people socialize, enabling us to post our thoughts, whereabouts, and photos for all our friends (one hundred thirty of them, on average) to see at a moment’s notice. We can keep up with one another’s lives as they’re happening, no sixty-minute catch-up phone call required. Relationships that would have otherwise fizzled out—like my friendship with Nick—are given new life. But for all its mastery of relationship maintenance—Facebook is the reason I’ve seen pictures of an elementary school classmate’s baby or discovered a friend of a friend of a friend’s blog—it’s not especially helpful for making entirely new connections. In fact, research shows that online networks neither expand the number of people to whom we feel close nor do they deepen our already-tight friendships.

  Personally, I have not made one new friend via Facebook. I wouldn’t even know where to start. I guess I could blindly message Chicagoans who also “like” Keeping the Faith and School of Rock, but that seems a stretch. Even for the new I’ll-talk-to-anyone-anywhere version of me.

  The world’s most popular social networking site was never intended to help foster new connections. In a 2007 interview with Time magazine (three years before he was named the magazine’s Person of the Year), Mark Zuckerberg explained that Facebook is about making communication more efficient between existing friends, not creating new ones, and that’s what makes it work. “Our whole theory is that people have real connections in the world,” he said. “People communicate most naturally and effectively with their friends and the people around them.… That’s a really big difference between Facebook and a lot of other sites. We’re not thinking about ourselves as a community—we’re not trying to build a community—we’re not trying to make new connections.”

  And so it seems I have used Facebook for its intended purpose. To look at Matt’s ex-girlfriend’s wedding photos, to be reminded of friends’ birthdays I might have otherwise forgotten, to get a where-are-they-now update of my childhood neighbors. And to reconnect with an old coworker—someone who, without Facebook, I would not be dining with tonight.

  Nick and I meet outside a bar near my apartment. It becomes clear pretty quickly that I would have been perfectly happy had Facebook not brought us back together. The quirks I thought were annoying but excusable when he was 18—the cockiness, the condescension (I chalked it up to him having a lot to learn)—are just plain rude at 26.

  Like when we first start catching up. I’m giving the Cliffs Notes of my life over the past seven years, talking easily as if we’re old friends. Which we are.

  Nick interrupts me mid-sentence.

  “I don’t recall you being so amped up,” he says. “I remember you more reserved.”

  Sorry to disappoint?

  “Reserved is not a word I’ve ever heard describe me,” I say. I’m laughing it off but he’s studying me as if he just realized he reached out to the wrong person.

  Later, when I mention that I’ve never been to New Orleans, he looks shocked.

  “That’s so weird. I thought you were well-traveled.”

  These mini-jabs aren’t so bad individually, but as Nick tallies all the reasons I’m not who he remembers, I want to explain that he’s exactly who I remember, and that it’s less charming on an adult.

  The average friendship doesn’t last a lifetime. In her book Best Friends Forever: Surviving a Breakup with Your Best Friend, psychologist Irene Levine writes, “A friendship, like a romantic relationship, is founded on two different personalities, both of whom grow and change, for better or for worse, over the course of time. There is no guarantee that two individuals, however close they once were, will grow in the same direction or remain compatible. Even when friendship is built on a solid foundation, the odds are overwhelmingly high that it will eventually fracture for one reason or another … Most friendships, even best or close ones, are fragile rather than permanent.” Nick and I fall under this fragile category. It seems ours was a situational friendship, born from a need—on both sides—to have someone our own age to talk to during those long summer workdays. It served a purpose, but that need is no longer.

  The evening makes me think Facebook is a blessing and a curse. Sure, it helps us keep track of people with whom we otherwise would have fallen out of touch. But sometimes relationships fade for a reason. They’re better left a memory.

  FALL:

  “COME HERE OFTEN?”:

  THE ART OF THE

  PICKUP

  CHAPTER 13

  Lately I’ve been trying to meet a friend at the local Starbucks or neighborhood bookstore. They seem like natural places for me to find a kindred spirit. In my imagination the encounter goes something like this:

  I’m camped out at the Paperback Favorites table, striking up conversations with women as they check out titles I love. “Oh, that’s a great one,” I’ll say.

  “Really? I’ve always wanted to read it,” potential BFF says.

  “You’ve got to. It’s smart but not too heavy, and it’ll make you laugh/cry/[insert verb here].”

  “That sounds perfect.”

  “Here’s my number, let’s chat once you’ve finished.”

  Starbucks would be a similar situation. I’d spot a seemingly friendly 20- or 30-something sitting at the table next to me, another writer tapping away at her keyboard on a Sunday morning. Maybe we’d chat about our respective projects, or knowingly joke about the regulars in line—a cast of characters themselves. We’d make another writing date, eventually meeting weekly to work side by side, becoming regulars ourselves.

  So far it hasn’t gone that way.

  Weekend bookstore shoppers aren’t there to linger and debate the merits of Jonathan Franzen or Dave Eggers. They have a laundry list of errands and want to get in, buy Oprah’s Book Club selection, and get out. I’ve stood at that Paperback Favorites table, waiting for my would-be friend to show up, and all that came of it was the store security guy eyeing me funny. I guess shoplifters linger, too.

  Thinking that customers with more time on their hands might settle in with a cup of coffee, I’ve tried hanging out in the bookstore café. Two problems with this plan: One, I couldn’t tell if the readers buried in books were open to approach. I want to be friendly but not annoying, and it can be a thin line. Two, there were no outlets. My half-juiced computer didn’t have much life left, so I had to abandon ship pretty quickly.

  There was one promising encounter at Starbucks a few weeks ago. I had set up my computer, phone, and entire home office when I noticed a girl at the next table over. She was around my age, looked friendly enough, and had on a red-and-white plaid scarf that reminded me of a hoedown. In a good way. We made eye contact and exchanged a friendly smile.

  A few minutes later she caught me checking her out again. Another smile.

  Eventually, she approached.

  “Would you mind watching my stuff while I run to the bathroom?”

  This was a good sign. She must have thought I looked honest and trustworthy, two prime attributes in a friend.

  “Not at all,” I said. “Also, that’s a great scarf.”

  Things slowed down after that. The sun glare through the window washed out my computer screen, so I switched seats. Now my back was to my new friend, which meant whenever I wanted to make my move I had to crane my neck to see her.

  In The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Steve Carell’s friend emphasizes the importance of using your “peripherals.” It’s one of Matt’s favorite movie quotes and comes up often since I’m a gawker. I’d hardly been nonchalant in my staring at scarf-girl before, and now I had to swing my whole body around to get a goo
d look. Even I knew there was nothing discreet about my behavior. Plus, every time I turned around, ready to strike up conversation, she was on the phone. Probably saying, “Some crazy girl keeps making eyes at me.”

  I found Callie on Gchat and asked for advice. She’s always been good at talking to random strangers. “Go the scarf route,” she said. “Ask her where she got it. That can lead to ‘Oh, I know that store,’ and then suddenly you’re talking. I’ve started so many conversations with strangers over shopping.”

  It’s not a bad idea. My inclination was to be more direct, to actually use a variation of “Come here often?” I was going to tell scarf-girl that I worked in Starbucks a lot and would love a study buddy. But I’ve been at this quest for so long now that I tend to bypass the art of friendly banter—conversation fore-play—and go in for the kill way too soon. I’ve gone from unnecessarily shy around potential friends to entirely too direct. Callie’s scarf approach seems more appropriate than “Hi. Nice to meet you. How often are you here and can you be my best friend and hang out with me every Sunday morning?”

  I prepped my opening line—“I hate to bother you, but can I ask where you got that scarf? I love it”—but I never got a chance to try it out. Scarf-girl was on the phone for the duration of her visit, and then she left. Just like that.

  My Starbucks trips since then have been even less exciting. If I’m trying to give off an open-for-friendship vibe, everyone else in the coffee shop is doing the opposite.

  Today I have the day off from work and am giving the bookstore-and-coffee-shop thing one last shot. I get to my local bookstore at 10 A.M. It’s filled with young moms—and one dad—awaiting storytime with their kids. I hadn’t anticipated this. It’s not ideal for friending, but I’ll work with what I’m given. Since everyone is gathered in the children’s section, I do a walk-through myself. Though I adore children’s books, I don’t stay longer than two minutes. Considering I’m the only adult here not accompanied by someone under the age of 7, I’m terrified of being mistaken for a child predator.

  I move on to the Starbucks across the street, a different one than where I met scarf-girl. Like any major city, Chicago has an outpost of the coffee chain every couple of blocks. You’re never more than five minutes from a Caramel Macchiato, or in my case, a hot apple cider.

  The only available outlet near my seat is underneath the table next to me, where a good-looking guy is typing away.

  “Can I share your outlet?” I ask.

  “Umm, I don’t know, it’s pretty valuable.” He’s joking, and flashes a smile that kind of makes me love him.

  “You’ve got a hot ticket there,” I say.

  “Don’t I know it. Hand me your plug.”

  We chat a bit more about nothing much—the weather, the day of work ahead—and turn our attention back to our computers.

  I’ve had no luck striking up conversations with women on these outings, but the first time I speak to a guy I’ve got a pal within minutes. One might argue that men are friendlier to women because they always have sex on the brain and every female is a possible partner, but that’s got to be oversimplifying it. I do think, however, that both genders have been trained in friendly flirting with the opposite sex since youth. It’s harmless, easy banter.

  Talking to women, specifically ones we don’t know, can be tougher. We fear being judged or laughed at, subject to mean girls who have become mean women. I’ve been lucky this year. Pretty much all the ladies I’ve met have been receptive to new friendships. Even if we weren’t the perfect fit, they’ve given me a fair shot. I truly believe that women are more open to making new pals than the haters give us credit for. As I’ve said, I expected to get the stink-eye from some of the women I tried to befriend, but that hasn’t happened. At least not yet.

  Still, it cannot be denied that women are hard on each other. In her book The Twisted Sisterhood, author Kelly Valen presents the results from a survey she conducted about female friendship. Seventy-four percent of respondents said they’d been “stung by other women’s criticisms and judgments” and 60 percent said they feel “uncomfortable, anxious, wary, awkward, cautious, intimidated, or even distrustful of other females.”

  Valen describes the moment when two women meet—whether it be in line at Starbucks or at a Mommy-and-Me group—like this: “Pay attention and you’re bound to see a curious, almost primitive ritual playing out whenever girls and women come together. Female checks out female, sizes her up, compares self. Hmmm, she may be thinking. Prettier? Smarter? Better pedigree? Better job? Better house? Better figure? More charming? More attractive-successful-attentive boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, kids? Better accessories? Better vacation? Better life? Find a flaw and you can exhale—luxuriate in your superiority.”

  Obviously, if we’re just meeting near the Paperback Favorites table, a woman can’t size up my career or my relationship with my husband. But Valen’s assessment has some validity when it comes to blindly picking up a friend I know nothing about. There’s no question that I’m nervous. Female judgment is scary. We all do it, but no one wants to be subjected to it.

  The women who responded to Valen’s survey weren’t happy about their take on female relationships—96 percent said they want something better for women and “lamented what they see as a growing insincerity to our interactions, a more guarded and unwelcoming vibe, and a very real challenge to make genuine reliable friendships.”

  My luck with women has probably been because I’ve found most of my new friends in situations where I knew we’d be on the same page. You don’t sign up for a class or a meet-and-greet if you aren’t willing to at least consider new friends. You don’t agree to be set up, or respond to a want ad, if you’re too busy for a relationship. Meeting women in their natural habitat will be significantly more difficult. No one on the coffee line asked for more friends. I’m just foisting myself on them.

  The rest of the day is productive on the work front, if not the friending one. There’s a table of women in their seventies who appear to meet here weekly, and it’s a nice reminder of why I launched this search in the first place. Even if I don’t meet a new friend at Starbucks today, I could be meeting old ones here soon enough.

  * * *

  FRIEND-DATES 43 AND 44. Kelly and Julie are both writers. I met Kelly at a reading for her new novel. I hadn’t read it yet, but I decided to go to the event anyway because a) her book, The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott, is a fictional story of the Little Women author, right up my alley, and b) despite my recent misfires, I still thought a book event would be perfect for picking up a compadre. Amanda—the new friend who blogged about me back in the day and is now in my cooking club—came with me. She was the perfect partner in crime. She loves making new friends and I knew she wouldn’t be offended if I made a move on someone else during our date. Also, she’s the type who’s good at approaching total strangers, so she could inspire confidence.

  I didn’t end up finding a new friend in the crowd of book buyers that day, but when I realized that Kelly lived nearby, I took the plunge and asked her out as she signed my new copy of her novel.

  “I’m a writer, too, and I’d love to pick your brain about the business,” I said. “I was wondering if you would be up for getting a drink sometime?”

  “Of course! We writers need to stick together,” she said.

  I followed up by email the next day. A week later we were eating sushi and trading war stories from our New York City publishing days. After dinner, we had a beer at the bar next door while Kelly graciously fielded my barrage of publishing questions and prepped me on what to expect if I pursued the life of a full-time writer. We parted with plans to get dinner with our husbands.

  Julie is a freelance magazine writer. She’s working on her first book—the story of her ten-year friendship with an online pen pal she’s never met—and came across my blog during her research. When her email address appeared in my in-box I couldn’t figure out why it looked so familiar. Until I searched
my old mail and realized we’d exchanged messages three years earlier, when I’d just moved to Chicago and she was editing a local fashion magazine. My networking has come full circle.

  Swap the sushi and beer for tea and cookies and my date with Julie wasn’t much different than the one with Kelly. Publishing stories, advice, repeat. But I’d been craving the writerly camaraderie, so I could have talked shop all day. Julie says she may leave Chicago for her home state of Michigan soon, but until then I plan on making her my Starbucks buddy.

  Writing can be a lonely endeavor. Kelly was exactly right when she said writers need to stick together, not only because it’s such a solitary pursuit but because there aren’t many of us in the Midwest. If I still lived in New York City—or, even better, Brooklyn—I’d probably meet an author or journalist at every turn. In L.A. I could maybe carve myself a niche in the screenwriters’ circle. But in Chicago we are few and far between. It’s a culturally rich city for sure, yet finding someone who can pass along editor contact information or tell you what to expect from the publishing process, someone who gets what you do, isn’t easy.

  Expanding my social circle this year has helped me widen my professional network, too. I have no fear anymore when it comes to contacting an author I admire or requesting a meeting with a local writer who might be good to know.

  I’ve sent very little fan mail in my life. My brief love affair with writing to celebrities came when I was in fifth grade and got one of those books filled with the addresses of where you could contact the stars. It even told me which of them would write back. I sent a note off to Whoopi Goldberg and shared a bedroom with the signed 8×10 photo I got in return (I’d framed it of course) until I graduated high school. But, until this search started, I’d never sent a note to say “great article!” or tried to make any professional connections with writers I didn’t know. What’s the point? I thought. It’s not going to make any difference. It won’t even get read. And maybe that would have been true in a pre-email world. But when I wrote my essay about feeling locally friendless, I was ecstatic to get messages from people who could relate. And sure, I’m not exactly a famous journalist, but I figured the same might hold true for more established writers. If they share their email address on their website, I choose to believe they want to hear from me.