There's no denying that things change as you age. For me, when I turned 35 it was like I hit some kind of mileage limit and all these crazy things started happening. I found myself getting aches and pains more often. My hair, much like it was when I was a teenager, is a dried out mess that hangs around my face like a bad thrift store picture frame. It seems there is now a never ended rotation of new lumps and bumps. These "skin tag" things. I find myself looking in the mirror and for the first time in my life, realizing that I actually look my age. I think "Who the hell is this person looking back at me? What the hell happened?"
In addition to the alarming body changes that I have only begun to list here, that happen as a person ages, I can't help but feel the social effects of aging. It gets harder to make and keep friends as you get older. When you have careers, kids, car payments, etc. it gets harder to maintain a social self. Maybe it's because when you realize enough people depend on you that you require insurance that makes sure that people are paid in the event of your death, you also realize that perhaps you should be more careful with your life. Maybe it's because life slowly loses it's vibrant color, and things start to wear us down. Maybe it's just that our interests change in our ever fluid persona's. But gone are the days when I always had a friend to call on, or a place to go with a group, or even enough friends to have a party on a Saturday night. Gone are the times when social interactions were seamless and natural. Now everything is awkward, and the world is more full than ever of people I don't know.
For me, some of my most awkward social experiences happen now where they happened many years ago. On a schoolyard. Perhaps it's a testament to how awkward social interactions become as we get older, or perhaps it's a testament to how socially awkward I have become, but these interactions fill me with anxiety.
Recently my daughter made a friend at school. Great for her, awkward for me. The kids spend 2 and a half hours together 5 days a week. We parents only see each other in passing for a few minutes and a lot of times, not even every day of the week. These girls have become great friends, and are so funny together! They could not be more opposite in looks. While my daughter is pale complected, short in stature, blonde and quite petite, her friend is very dark skinned. She has black hair which is always neatly done in a number of matching barrettes and hair ties. She is at least 2 inches taller then my daughter, and although she is not overweight at all, she is just built all around bigger than my daughter. Every day when my daughter goes to enter and exit the school, this girl hugs her tight and lifts her into the air! When you see this, you want them to be able to spend more time together and forge a genuine friendship. But when it come to interaction between the parents, something gets lost. What do you do? Do you immediately exchange numbers? I have exchanged numbers with plenty of parents before, but we never actually call each other. Do I have this girl over to my house? I don't know her, or her mother. How do I know how this kid will behave? Do I bring my daughter over there? I don't know what these people are like. Are they mean? Are they indulgent and kind? Are they religious? Will they think ill of my children if they find out we are not? My daughter is not yet at her appropriate age level with speech. Will they be able to understand her?
Ok, so how about we all get together moms and kids. What do we talk about? What if we don't have anything in common. What if she is a zealous republican who hates women's rights and gun control? Why are these possibilities so much more frightening now than I can ever recall them being before?!
Although one or both of these girls asks about getting together outside of school almost every day, who knows if they actually will or not. Right now, this girl's mother and I are trying in vain to get to know each other over 2 or 3 minute interactions as we usher our daughters out of the crowded entryway of the preschool, and rush through the cold to our cars. There's no upcoming event like a birthday party that would make this any easier. I guess I have always felt silly about these school related anxieties. As adults we should have left school related anxieties behind long ago, right? But it occurred to me today that I am probably not the only person who feels this way.
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