you gotta have (single female) friends
posted July 17, 2005 at 07:11 pm

It's funny how you don't realize that something important was missing from your life until you have it back again.

Before I hit my twenties and got married, I always had a best girl friend. For some reason, after I got married, the woman who was my best friend at the time and I drifted farther and farther apart, and I never really brought anyone into my life to replace her.

Now, don't get me wrong - Brenna is obviously a female, and I'm closer to her than pretty much anyone else in my life right now. We stay in touch all day because of work, we're very much alike in how we think, and we've definitely bonded in a unique way. It's just hard to "be there" for one another in the specific way I'm talking about here when one of you is married in Minnesota and the other one is single in Texas. ;)

I have other friends too, both former co-workers, one a married woman with kids, the other a gay man with dogs. The gay man in particular is someone who I also consider to be one of my best friends, as he knows more intimate details of my life than most people do. But (for obvious reasons of sexual preference), we travel in different social circles, making it hard to hang out on a more than occasional basis.

And, I've had a man in my life over the past few months who has also become a close friend. He has held my hand (and handed me several tissues) through some extraordinarily tough emotional times lately. He's also been a good "self-esteem cheerleader", continually reminding me that I'm smart, attractive, and entirely worthy of being treated with a higher level of respect than I've been allowing from certain other men recently. Sometimes you do need someone else to tell you "Forget him, he's immature, he's insecure, he's a loser, he's beneath you!!" over and over before you really start to believe it for yourself. Even so, it's easy to question the sincerity of those words when the person saying them to you probably has his own selfish motives, wink, wink.

So what I've really been needing is a friend who is more like me than not, a single female who's trying to navigate the same shark-infested waters that I'm swimming in. And I didn't fully appreciate that she was missing until I found her.

Granted, our friendship is at the early stage, and like any other relationship, you never know exactly how it's going to work out. But the really weird thing is that the first time I saw this woman, I had an immediate internal reaction of liking her immensely. I can't explain it other than to say I somehow intuitively knew she was someone I should - and would - get to know better.

Now that I have, I'm really enjoying her presence in my life. Love ya, Jules!! :)