Marrying Your Friends
I’m trying to cover my mouth, my face, my every seeping-out-emotion so my roommate Mijanne can’t hear me cry. The sobs are loud like ambulances; they’re unforgiving at best. The three feet of space that separates our beds isn’t enough distance to distract her.
“Mac, are you okay?”
“I don’t know.”
I get out of bed and get in the shower and hope to wash off whatever it is that I can’t seem to gather under my control. Finally, I fall asleep when I’m too exhausted to keep thinking and crying and worrying about everything.
Real friendship means a lot of things, but that night, it meant letting myself be seen and heard and loved in the midst of pain that I couldn’t muzzle with a pillow.
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Lately I’ve been thinking about why I walk away from my friends when things get hard- why I think it’s better to sit alone in a room than share honestly with those around me. And I’ve been considering why in the difficult moments I feel tempted to leave for a new place.
It’s backwards, how most of us operate, recognizing that all we really want is to be known and loved. But for whatever reason we consistently steer away from the opportunity to receive the very thing we want. The temptation to leave or retreat is heavy, and the struggle to root yourself is ever-present.
When I want to check out my mind always goes to Brooklyn and how much better everything must be there. I think about more choice and opportunity, better stores and efficient mass transit. I think about a thriving art community and how much I want that. What I don’t think about is how I can make where I currently am all of those things. More importantly, what I always forget about is the fact that people never make their way into my daydreams. When I get honest with myself I know this is true: whatever is there (meaning Brooklyn or whatever place you have in mind) can be created here. And ultimately, people are more important than place. Still, there’s a creeping disconnect in our minds about how we function in our relationships. It says that a good shopping district or market scene is worth relocating over; it says that sadness and hard times aren’t okay to wear on your face.
The problem is, is that if you’re like me, leaving has little to do with Brooklyn or dreams or a job and everything to do with this: I never want people to see me break. I spend too much time trying to save face. And so when things get heavy I feel a strong hand pulling me to walk away.
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In all of this I find myself comparing friendships to marriage.
Why is it that we are willing to marry for life- to commit to forever with a significant other- but the very nature of friendship feels transitory? What would it look like to remain in the lives of those who surround us as we age and walk through life?
What if our friendships lasted longer than the four-years spent at college, or didn’t dissipate when we get married? How different would it feel if we resisted the allure to get a new set of friends when we have children? The great illusion is that as we grow and change we need to find people who experience all the same things as us. The rebuttal is, is that children and jobs and dreams should never separate us. In their very nature they should align us more closely with the heart of God. And as we change we should be brought together by the things that are happening in our lives.
A few weeks ago my good friend Cole reminded me of the beautiful truth that no matter where we are in our lives we can be used. Our conversation freed me to loosen my grip and breathe a little more deeply trusting that I didn’t have to be strong all the time. We can, with a great sign of relief, take our game face off and get real. That’s how much bigger God is than we are; He is capable of taking the most fractured parts of us and create good. And so to isolate or to walk away is refusing the depth that comes when we remain rooted in the friendships that we have. Sadness makes me want to stay in my room rather than spend time with the people who love me. I’m finding though, that’s not the way it’s supposed to work. The most broken parts of who I am is a conduit for greater depth to those around me. If all my friends want to do is talk about nailpolish (which they don’t) and I am depressed, being in their lives and being honest forces them to look at their own hearts and carve out room for greater closeness.
When I’m weak, my friends can be strong.
When I’m strong, my friends can be weak.
The most revelatory part about all of this is that both our weakness and strength have purpose. We’ve been told for so long that it’s the strength that holds our friendships together. The illusion tells us that only strength is for the good. That’s why everything is so flipped upside down, such a paradox in the Kingdom. And so, if we are freed to not walk away when things get hard, Brooklyn might lose its grand appeal and we might just be able to stay friends with people longer than just a few years.
Cole NeSmith inspired a good deal of this. He makes cool things.
