Friends -- too many far away, not enough local!

[Girrrl]

I'm having a problem right now, and I'm posting about it here because I'm wondering if anyone can relate. I suspect I'm not the only one with this problem...
I simultaneously have too many friends and not enough, as weird as that sounds. I have no *local* friends, which is frustrating because I get really bored and lonely hanging out around town by myself. And at the same time, I have *so many* out-of-town/out-of-state friends that I rarely see and we keep in touch with through email, and trying to maintain that many friendships through email is overwhelming. More often than not, it takes me forever to email someone, and in the meantime, I am plagued with guilt and feel like a "bad friend" for not keeping in touch. I'm 24, and it seems like us 20-somethings move around rather frequently, which is why we can easily have so many long-distance friends - you make friends, then you move or they move, and suddenly you're hours apart and have to rely on email. And although I hate to admit it, it's damned hard work trying to keep up a friendship this way. When my friends and I lived close by (e.g. were in college together), being friends was so easy and natural - hanging out downtown, taking off for a concert at the spur of the moment, calling each other up to say "Hey, let's go get ice cream" and then doing just that. Or I'd go to a meeting or gathering and see a whole bunch of my friends at once.
But now, we're all scattered throughout the state(s), and we rarely see each other, and almost never spontaneously. Seeing each other now requires planning and schedule-coordinating, and we're all always so damn *busy*. So in the meantime, we email - or at least, we'd like to think we do, but usually we procrastinate and don't email for several days/weeks/months, and we always *mean* to email each other but often don't, and then feel bad. Off the top of my head, I can think of approximately 20 friends that I need to email, and it's overwhelming. I can't do it. It would take me hours to get caught up on emails, and I hate it how it feels like a chore. I feel so bad that I have "email [friend]" on my To-Do list, along with "fold laundry" and "clean out car." It shouldn't be this way.
I love my friends dearly and don't want to lose them, but I so desperately wish we could be friends in person instead of through email. With many of these friends on my people-I-need-to-email list, our in-person friendship was wonderful in a way that can't easily be duplicated through email. For instance, we would have goofy wrestling matches, go skiing, go to feminist film festivals, make up songs and laugh until our stomachs hurt, go to random concerts, play in the woods, march in peace rallies, bake cookies, hula-hoop, throw potlucks... And now all of that has been reduced to sporadic emails that begin with an apology for not writing in so long, and we update each other on work and school and family. It's just not the same, and to me, it's not what friendship is about. I am sick of emailing, because it's only conversation, and with most of these people, our friendships were so not about mere conversation. I don't want to just talk. I want to be together and laugh and play and walk and climb trees and make stupid faces at each other and moongaze and wrestle and dance and hug and joke and sit in contented silence and be able to see each other's eyes. And I don't know what to do! I don't want to lose my friends. But I also don't want to force myself to write 20+ emails when my heart's not in it, when I'd rather just have them here in front of me to hug and chat and laugh with.
And at the same time as I feel overwhelmed by having too many friends to try and keep in touch with, I'm feeling very lonely and isolated because I don't have any local friends whom I can hang out with. I go everywhere alone - the movies, out to eat, music festivals, shopping, walking... it's depressing. And it's a weird feeling, because emailing or even calling one of my many far-away friends wouldn't ease my loneliness... I would still be all alone at the movies and stores and restaurants and concerts. I know I can make local friends if I try harder; i.e., join some groups, be brave and strike up conversations, join the gym or something, whatever... I just get so cynical about it all. I hate to admit it, but right now I feel like WHY BOTHER making new friends, if one or both of us is just gonna move away in a couple years and thus have our friendship reduced to an email relationship?! I really don't need my People To Email list to grow. I live in a college town, so this is a temporary living place for most people around my age - most people move on after graduation. So will this pattern just keep repeating?? I meet someone, we develop a wonderfully satisfying friendship, then they move and we begin emailing?? Over and over? It's so damn frustrating. I really wish I had a friend to call up on a random, rainy Saturday afternoon to say, hey, let's go catch a movie... a friend to go drink hot chocolate with after work... a friend with whom to share the little, daily things with...
Is that really too much to ask? It seems like such a simple, normal thing to want and to have...

[TankgirlyC]

To be totally blunt.....this is what life does. You meet people.....life goes on and usually one of you moves.
From there you get that large E mail list....and if your heart isnt in it and your not feeling less lonely after talking to these people....then I think its safe to say its time to move on.

Now if you dont want to write 20+ individual E mails...you could make it one mass E mail...and add personal notes to each person in it that everyone can read.....

In each stage of life we meet people and move on. Im sure graduating from HS you had friends and you all went to different colleges and drifted apart because of the distance. What your going through now is the same thing......

Also....how is it that you have 20+ CLOSE friends...that seems like an oddly high number.....but maybe its just me.

[pisces2473]

No, I also think it's odd you have 20+ close friends. I have one best friend from college and maybe a few more who I don't keep in touch with frequently, but will run into at social events and stuff. My other roommates/friends turned out to be horrible people and I stopped talking to them within the past year. I have a few friends from my hometown/HS and that's it.

I can identify with what you are saying about not having people to do stuff with like you used to (going to the diner at 2 am because you could) and I've been having a hard time with that, but you know what? I don't have time to do that stuff anymore. I have a job that I have to get up early for--not classes that didn't meet until 2 pm. I have an apartment to take care of, not a dorm room. Food to make, not a dining hall to stop off at. This is growing up. I think the first year or two out of college are most difficult, but hang in there.

[coll214]

I think it's just part of growing up- the point where former close friends turn into casual aqquaintenances. It's sad, but it happens. One example would be HS like Tank said. I know i've whittled down who i talk to from that time. It just sort of happened naturally. Sure I'd like to still talk to some...but life happens.

I"ve also had friends from college who have since moved away and it's the same thing. You try to email and occasionally talk on the phone, but it doesn't happen as often as you like...You're lucky you have such a large group of people that still make an effort to contact you...even if it is just by email. Are they all from the same time (like college) or is it just a few from working together, HS, etc. You could also try like Tank suggested; doing group emails. Such as the one for the people from college, one from work, one from HS...that way you aren't trying to write that many all the time...

[RedHead1420]

Situations like this help you weed out who your true friensd are. But I've found that those people that you do manage to keep in touch with, you get closer with, even if physically you're much farther away than ever. For example, my best friend from high school and I went to different universities, 800 miles apart, she studied abroad in Italy for a semester and is moving to France on Saturday, and I've been in NC for a couple months now, but we're closer friends than ever. Through the magic of email and cell phones, we talk more now than we did when we first parted ways to go to college. And as for college friends, I think that the same thing can happen. You learn who you really want to keep in touch with, but sometimes the actual distance can make you closer friends. Or, in the other case, it totally pushes you away and that can be how you learn who your friends are and who they aren't. That's just my experience...

[pisces2473]

I think sometimes it's easier to stay connected with HS/hometown friends because you have grown up with these people, and have known them for a long time, whereas college friends, by the time you graduate, you've only known them for 3 or 4 years. You're used to keeping in touch at a distance with those from home, emailing and seeing each other on holiday breaks. Your college friends you lived on top of, practically. You lived together, ate together, had class together, were in clubs and orgs together, etc. So when you left school, you took it for granted that you'd keep in touch and then you don't. This has been my experience--being closer to people from HS than college. Oh well.

[coll214]

I seem to also have stayed in closer contact w/ friends from HS. We all lead drastically different lives, but seem to be more willing to make time to do things together. Whereas friends from college have moved away and when they do visit can't always make time to do everything that they want to...

[hajime]

Well, I think a good general rule of thumb is, if a relationship fills you up and leaves you feeling positive, then keep doing what you're doing and maintain that relationship. If after e-mailing, you feel even more lonely... well, then I don't think it's worth it at that point. Hey, if the person comes into town at some point again, maybe that will renew that relationship and you could have a good time just like previously-- even if you haven't been e-mailing.

But, sad as it is, people drift apart, and sometimes that just has to happen... I know how you feel though-- that is one of the worst feelings in the world... I guess that's partly why people long for their "true love"-- someone who will "always" be with them, and will grow old with them through it all..

I'm sure all that seems kind of obvious to you ;) Anyway, it kind of seems strange to me that having so many e-mails to write would be a chore if you are lonely IRL... I'm lonely IRL too, and I love wasting my time writing e-mails (not that I have 20+ people I keep in contact with regularly) or posting on BBs ;). Just curious.

[Rainster]

Girrl -- I can totally relate. All my close college friends are on the east coast, and all my HS friends on the west coast have all changed so much (hell, so have I) and veered off on different life paths that it's just plain awkward to hang out now.

But I actually *love* emailing them all, even if it means a couple emails a day or a long-distance phone call once a month (or whenever my budget can take it!). Even racking up credit card debt flying out for all of their weddings.....!!!!! These are the people I see myself staying in touch with for decades, so I don't mind the extra effort. Um, or credit card payments.

As for finding new people, I'm cynical too. Coworkers are cool but you need to maintain the professionalism; and meeting people at social events or volunteer events or political events or whatever takes a hell of a lot of time! It took me a while to break into the social scene once I moved back home... and even now, with a couple core people to hang out with, I feel like I can't ever replicate the depth of some of my friends from school.

[collegedazed]

Girrrl:

I understand your reluctance to attempt to make new local friends out of fear that they will all leave soon, but isn't college just as transitory as any other situation, perhaps more?

College students drop out, transfer schools, graduate during different semesters, et cetera so people come and go a lot.

Perhaps if you make new friends they will stay around longer than you expect.

[Lipgloss Boost]

Yep, I can rerlate! I have no social ife. None! Look at me for God's-sake! It's 6:15am on a Saturday. Where am I? At work. Where am I usually? At work. I have no social life. Without exaggeration. But I need money so I take the shifts they call me for (I work at a men's shelter).

I don't've any solutions just empathy. I lost contact with most of my university friends. I went to college to collect new friends, but didn't make any. So I e-mail since there isn't anyone to socialize with. If there was though - when would I?

You're not alone!

[minhaz]

G,

I seem to have the exact same situation as you, except I've been trying to blame everything from work, to other responsibilities in getting in my way of making friends. Most of my good friends moved away too, and I find myself in the same town I graduated college, from, and being lonely. Also, it doesn't help, that I live in Huntsville, Alabama either!!

I try to keep in touch with my best friends from high school and college, but I really miss having local buddies to hang out with. Though my gf lives with me, she's pretty lonely too. The few good friends she has are also far far away.

You know, for a while I thought that this situation applied more specifically to me, since I only came to this country back in 1996, hence, I had no choice but to have long distance friends.

But just like the rest of the people here, I've become very cynical, and don't bother to make friends. I had made a good friend a few months ago, (while riding my bike), but then he moved back to Ohio, citing that this town is boring, and he has more friends and family back in ohio. Oh well....

But I do feel much better knowing that there are other people with the same issues as me thought! :)

[veela]

I'm right there with the rest of you. I have lived in the same place all my life so I have family and friends around but have drifted away in one way or another from most of my friends here. I spent a semester in London and made some of my best and most amazing friends there but now that we're back in the states we all live scattered around and I only get to see them a weekend or two a year! I work with mostly older people that I like but can't exactly "hang out" with and don't know how else to meet people.

Anyone out there in Pittsburgh???

[neesie209]

I totally know how you feel. My close HS friends that I still keep in touch with are now all over the place (from a 6 hr drive away, to a 2 day drive away), and my college friends are either too far b/c of where my college was in relation to where I am living now, or they have moved even farther. Plus, the few that are only a few hours away are SO busy with work and stuff.
It's hard work to stay in touch. My advice to you is to put the effort in with people that you REALLY care to keep a lifelong relationship going with. Otherwise, you dont wanna resent having to e-mail them,ya know? I also do like the idea of mass e-mailing with personal notes added. I have done that often when I want to send an "update" to a bunch of people (ie- major life changes).
Being a person who has moved to a new area before, I have learned tricks to meet new people. I found that when I got the courage to just go out there and join clubs, groups or lessons, I ended up making a few friends (then they introduce you to their friends!).
Keep active, and you'll find people to hang out with!!

[neesie209]

By the way- where in the Bay area are you moving? I grew up in the Bay Area, and I also live about a half hour from the East Bay right now! :)

[mcp]

Oh, do I hear you. I had a strong group of girlfriends in both high school and college, but then I graduated from college 2 years ago and moved back to my hometown in south Florida. None of my high school friends did not return after college so I felt left high and dry. My boyfriend moved down here and we now live together. I've gotten the same advice, take a class, join a group...but there just doesn't seem to be anything like that targeted to younger 20ish people. A lot of the people my age who are living here grew up here and never left so they have a strong network of friends still. I am so lonely -- I miss friends so badly. Don't get me wrong my boyfriend is great, but he's a boy you know :) ? He won't go get a pedicure with me or shop for 48 hours straight. Forget work friends -- about 2 people at my job are under 30 and they, again, did not leave this area for school and still have their own group. I've tried hanging out with them, but they all know each other going back to junior high so I still feel like an outsider...not to mention that I don't have that much in common with them to begin with. Sigh, thanks for that chance to vent...I feel much better :)

[veela]

that is pretty much exactly my situation. i did have a boyfriend move to my town and live with me and not having many girlfriends of my own really put stress on that relationship because i relied too heavily on him. be careful about that.

i've tried taking classes and currently i've been applying for second, part-time jobs in environments where younger people work just to help but it's really hard to meet people. and i think when you're a girl it's worse because girls hate each other! what's up with that? i don't hate anyone until given a reason but it happens way too often that girls just don't give each other a chance. when i meet boys they only want to date even though i tell them i don't so it's hard to be friends with them too! ARGH!