You know how almost all podcasts are unbearable but you keep groping around in your podcast app for something that will get you through doing the rest of the dishes? What if I told you that each of your friends hosted a podcast with a call-in segment where the only guest is you. Wouldn’t that be better? You could get all your questions answered in real time. This is the “voice call,” and I know this makes me a generational traitor, but it is wonderful.
Last fall, I was going through something and I felt confounded. I didn’t want to write about it or convert it to a joke for Twitter. It wasn’t something I needed to hash out in therapy. I’d already talked to Nick about it plenty. I felt itchy with the experience, keeping it all to myself. What did I want to do exactly? And I realized that I had invented the concept of talking to a friend.
It’s really not fair to say that we don’t have friends here, because we do. But we’ve only lived here for 18 months! There are one thousand essays about how it’s tough to make friends as a parent, but it’s true. I’m pretty fearless these days about getting someone’s number, inviting someone over, saying yes to invitations, knowing that I have a lot to offer and not assuming everyone hates me. It still takes a lot of interacting to reach the degree of intimacy that close friendship offers, and often I feel like I’m just having the same safe conversations about kids and the weather over and over again.
The best way I’ve found to fast-track that closeness is to a.) make friends at work or b.) interact with someone online all day every day. A work friend is someone you are seeing as often as the members of your household and you are probably having to solve problems together with some stakes to them, the way you would if you went on vacation with someone.
Online friendship, well, if you have signed up to receive an email newsletter from me, I will assume you have some friendships you’ve forged online. How do you get to that place of comfort with new friends irl? When do you get to enjoy in-person shitposting, aka being your full horrible weird self?
Back to my main recommendation though. I am not going to be calling my newish local friends on the phone. That would be unhinged. But I do have cherished friendships back in Ohio, and elsewhere, and as much as I am committed to commenting “omfg” and “ilu” on every single leg of their Instagram Stories, I need to screw up the courage to call sometimes.
Sjanneke and I were texting furiously about something and she asked if we could just talk on the phone about it. She notoriously does not love a phone call so this was a treat. We talked forever, like the teenaged besties we once were and still are at heart.
I saw that I missed a call from Michelle on Saturday and how sad is it that I assumed it was a butt-dial? I clarified with her via text and she confirmed that she had been attempting to place an intentional phone call to me!!!! The next morning, Nick was out doing the grocery shop and I was supervising the destruction of my house by two small people, and I thought: I bet Michelle is doing exactly what I’m doing right now. So I called her.
After I talked to Michelle for close to an hour, Jane was down for a nap and I agreed to go to the park with Desi. He was set on riding his bike, which is a balance bike that he cannot or will not use as intended. It took us 30 minutes to travel a half-mile to the park. I find these trips unbearable and it is why I usually lobby for chucking him in the bike trailer and zipping directly to our destination. But then he’d never learn to ride a bike.
In the ice age that it took for us to reach the park, a new neighbor (someone I hope to befriend) slowed down in her car to say hi to us. I reminded Nick when I got home that we should start inviting people over on Friday nights for pizza. Maybe if we do that consistently, by next year I will achieve shitposting irl status with these new friends. Like most things worth waiting for, I might have to actually wait for it.
yr mate,
Evie
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A couple of things! I wanted to share this article I wrote about childhood sleep consultants that was published last week in Vox: The exhausting, lucrative world of childhood sleep consulting. I love the illustration so much and want to buy a print for the kids’ room. Special thanks to editor Alanna Okun for letting me keep the phrase “millennial dipshit.”
Housekeeping: You can always read this newsletter for free. You can always leave a cash tip when it strikes you. A few of you have reached out to encourage me to set up a Patreon so you can do a recurring donation, for your own ease. “Set it and forget it.” So I did that! Here it is. If you become a patron, I will write you an effusive thank you email because I love you.
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