The Long Haul: Summer of Friendship #9

8/28/20 - Friendships that stretch into years and decades hold a special place in our lives, and require special tending. As we conclude our Summer of Friendship series, we hear about your big friendships that have gone the distance.

Transcript below.

Listen on Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Spotify.



CREDITS

Producer: Gina Delvac

Hosts: Aminatou Sow & Ann Friedman

Theme song: Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn

Composer: Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs.

Associate Producer: Jordan Bailey

Visual Creative Director: Kenesha Sneed

Merch Director: Caroline Knowles

Editorial Assistant: Laura Bertocci

Design Assistant: Brijae Morris

Ad sales: Midroll

LINKS

Big Friendship

HARDCOVER

Bookshop.org | Indiebound | Barnes & Noble | Amazon | Books A Million

AUDIOBOOK

Read by the authors! Listen to a sample here. Buy from: Libro.fm | Apple | Kobo | Audible | Downpour | Audiobooks.com | Chirp

E-BOOK

Nook | Kobo | Amazon | Apple Books | Google Play | Books A Million

Big Friendship is also out now in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada:

UNITED KINGDOM

Waterstones | Hive | Foyle’s | Amazon UK | Blackwell’s | The Book Depository

CANADA

Indigo | Munro’s | Amazon.ca

AUSTRALIA

Booktopia | Dymock’s | The Nile | QBD

NEW ZEALAND

Fishpond



TRANSCRIPT: THE LONG HAUL

[Ads]

(0:30)

Aminatou: Welcome to Call Your Girlfriend.

Ann: A podcast for long-distance besties everywhere.

Aminatou: I'm Aminatou Sow.

Ann: And I'm Ann Friedman.

Aminatou: Hi Ann Friedman, how's it going?

Ann: You know. Hello, we're here. [Laughter]

Aminatou: [Laughs] Sorry that was really funny.

Ann: I'm like I really don't have much . . . it's hard to answer like how are you doing or what's happening or how's it going questions lately. I'm just like yep, we're here. [Laughs]

Aminatou: Listen, we are here. I have to say that I'm excited about today's episode because we get to hear from other people and not from us and it has been really fun collecting voicemails from listeners all summer about their big friendships and I'm really excited to dive into them today.

[Theme Song]

(1:44)

Ann: Yeah, this is the final episode of our Summer of Friendship. Summer as we have defined it is ending with this episode. [Laughs] Our arbitrary definition. And yeah, you know, we write in the book about how much we love hearing other people's friendship stories and so there have been a few points on this virtual book tour where we've done like radio call-in shows where people will call and talk about their friendships which are hands down the most pleasant part of promoting this thing like easily. I could listen to other people talk about the friends they love forever and ever.

Aminatou: Same. Same, same, same. And I think just on a very personal note it makes me feel very good and also affirmed, you know? I think a thing that is always hard about promoting this work and promoting any of your work really is feeling like oh yeah, you think you have something really special to say and I maintain from the beginning I have nothing special to say. And the reason we talk about our friendship so much is not because we think our friendship is super special and that no one else enjoys the same kind of friendship. It really is because the more we normalize sharing accounts of deep friendship the more people are able to just be open about how they're doing their own friendships. And so the reason I like hearing from other friends is friendship is deeply important to me and I know that it's deeply important to other people so normalize talking about it. All of the time in fact.

Ann: It's true. It is very much an institution that is made by the two specific friends within it. So like even you and I, like the dynamics we describe about our own friendship can apply in various ways to other friendships that we have and that other people have. But the totality of that is unique which is great and is also what gives me the great sense of voyeurism when I'm listening to how other people do friendship. I'm like hmm, is that how that comes up for you? Yes, tell me more. [Laughs]

(3:45)

Aminatou: Well listen, let's dive in. The first voice memo is from Miriam who's calling in from Troy, New York and she describes her best friendship with someone whose mom like her mom went to high school with and then their moms were BFFs. So I just love this idea of next-generation besties and the friendship just continuing through generations.

Miriam: Hi, my name is Miriam. I live in Troy, New York. My longest friendship is with someone who I refer to as my destiny friend because our moms were friends when they were in high school and when they were friends and they were growing up and they were figuring themselves out they thought it would be so wonderful if they could have kids around the same time as each other so that their kids could be friends. And then now here my best friend Sophie and I are to this day still friends, still talking and texting regularly, and even during quarantine we recently started a project where we're sending each other poems, both poems that we write ourselves and that we just love and want to share with each other. And I'm so grateful to my destiny friend for always being there for me and for being willing to be as silly as we've always been together.

Ann: Ugh, do you have any friends like this that are kind of like the next -- the children of people your parents are very close to?

Aminatou: No I do not and this is really making me regret that because I know how special my mom's best friends were to her and vice-versa. Now I'm feeling a pull to email some of their children.

Ann: Yeah. And I think I have sort of tenuous contacts with people who I grew up with whose parents were friends with my parents but nothing that I could really plausibly call a friendship. And so this story's really special. You know, also because for me one of the ways I can tell I'm really close to someone is if I know their parents' first names or I know enough about their lives to know even if I don't have a relationship with them to kind of have some fluency with the people who raised them. There's something about that in this as well where I think about what would it be like to know someone in this particular way? It must be extremely powerful. So this next one is a friendship that began as a pen palship which as a child that had many, many pen pals, several of them total strangers like this voicemail we're about to hear, I love this. This analog early equivalent to the way that I think some people make friends now which is like meeting them on the Internet first and developing this digital relationship before -- or even without ever having an in-person part of it as well.

(6:35)

Allison: Hi, my name is Allison. I'm calling from just outside of Philadelphia. I'd just like to tell you about a long-term friendship that I've had with my pen pal of over 22 years now I think. We actually met through the American Girl magazine back when there was an article about pen pals. You could write in and they would match you up with another subscriber. This is obviously a very different time. I feel like this would never work now with all the creepy people out in the world. But I got matched with Malerie and she lives in Turlock, California, like central California, and so we just started writing to each other for many, many, many years and eventually we did meet. She came to visit with her then-boyfriend, now-husband and I also attended her wedding in California and we've met up once since then as well.

It's honestly been one of the best friendships/relationships of my entire life. We don't really write that often to each other anymore because we're older and busy but she's still one of my absolute best friends and it's really a very different relationship to any of my other friends because I feel like I can literally tell her absolutely anything and she won't judge me. It's almost like writing in a diary when you're writing a letter but then it's going to someone so you know someone's going to read it. It's just a really cool relationship to have.

(8:00)

Aminatou: Man, I love this call so much. As you know I am a big proponent of the post office in every single country and this is really taking me back to my own pen pal relationships some of whom I'm actually still very close to today and I love this. I love everything about Allison and her love of her pen pals.

Ann: Ugh. Also shout-out to American Girl magazine for facilitating this friendship. [Laughter]

Aminatou: Man do you remember ever as a kid getting these pen pal requests that were always some sort of chain that you could not drop and feeling the stress of oh man, I can't be the one that ruins the pen pal chain around the world? Because that was very much an animating force in my anxiety in my middle school and high school life.

Ann: I mean for me it was when I was younger but I think I acquired a bunch of pen pals because I have a sibling who was diabetic and so we had Diabetes Forecast Magazine which had a find a pen pal thing in the back. And I am pretty sure I weaseled my way into that pen pal scheme and that is how I got on these old-fashioned mail chains. And I had dozens and dozens of pen pals. I had a Tupperware box I would keep under my bed with all my letters and letter writing supplies and lists of when I owed replies to people. Whew, it was a whole lifestyle for me prior to my teen years.

Aminatou: I know! It was a huge lifestyle. I also remember living in Nigeria and the post office not being reliable at all and all the schemes I had to go to to make sure the letter would go out and actually get received. This is really taking me back, man. I love this. Obviously we've all made friends online and I think it is very . . . there are a lot of parallels there. But there is just something about the challenge of the post office that is really taking me back.

(9:55)

Ann: Ugh, the challenge of the post office indeed. [Laughter]

Aminatou: Support USPS please. Call your congressman and make sure the post office is well-funded and taken care of. My favorite government institution. Okay, do you want to hear another call?

Ann: Absolutely. Tell me about it.

Aminatou: Okay. I'm excited about this next call because it is about a friendship between two straight dudes who are super into their own big friendship so here it is.

Bill: Hi Call Your Girlfriend, my name is Bill, loyal listener, and I have a friend named Jack that I've been friends with for most of my life. Almost 30 years now, since junior high days. And we've had our fair share of relationships. We're both straight men so we've had relationships with other women over the years but we never seem to make those relationships stick. One time we were playing basketball a few years ago and one of our long-time friends who we played basketball with jokingly referred to us as life partners. And me and my friend Jack laughed it off and we joke about it occasionally but in a weird way I really do think especially after listening to your Big Friendship podcasts that we have one of those friendships where girls have come and gone but we've stayed friends this entire time. And it's evolved and deepened and we're not the same friends we were when we were younger or in our 20s doing typical stuff that often fizzles out with guys when you stop having those activities together. We've kind of been able to frankly become emotionally intimate in a way we haven't been with the women in our lives. So as much as it kind of stunned when we first were approached as life partners, you know, in a way I think there was something to be said about it.

(12:00)

Ann: You know we have been asked in some interviews about this book whether big friendships are something that only people who identify as women experience and I have to say that messages like this really underscore to me that it is sometimes a matter of vocabulary and not emotion, like what gets categorized this way. You know, I think that for all sorts of reasons related to the way different genders are socialized, related to homophobia and the way that is expressed through society, that it is more acceptable for women to kind of vocalize this sort of platonic love. And when I hear messages like this and being like oh yeah, the love is the same, it's just the way that we do or don't encourage conversation about it that differs I have to admit I feel a little bit of sadness about that and also some hope that more stories like this will change it.

Aminatou: Same, same, same.

Ann: Okay, let's listen to another one.

Cara: Hey there, my name is Cara. I'm calling in from Washington, D.C. I wanted to share a funny story about friendships and reunions. So my best friend Marissa and I, we have been friends since we were in third grade. Now we're 29, so a long time. I first saw her as a cheerleader and thought she was just the coolest, most bad-ass girl I ever saw and wanted to be her friend.

And so fast-forward a few years we get into a fight where . . . I mean it's honestly a little hard to share in that, you know, she was practicing self-harm. Practicing? I don't know. But she was hurting herself and I found out and she told me not to tell anyone and I told my mom. Yada, yada, I thought I was being a good friend. But we were obviously strained and my mom and her mom called each other and talked to each other and said how we had to get together and make up.

(14:24)

And so unbeknownst to me my mom was driving me to McDonald's one day and instead of going through the drive thru she's like "Oh, let's go in." I was like "Oh, okay." We go in and I see Marissa and her mom walk in. I was just like oh! My heart dropped. They sat with us and, you know, told us that it was important for us to talk out what was going on because we were really good friends. It was important to get past hurt and have a conversation. So then they left and went to a different table and brought us over French fries and milkshakes, or McFlurries rather, and we talked it out and it was wonderful. And, you know, we -- the next day it was just like nothing ever happened and that's kind of how our friendship has been ever since, ebbs and flows, but we have those get-together moments where we talk everything out and it's all okay at the end of the day.

Aminatou: I love this! I love the moms staging an intervention because I love that it's so not chill for your mom wanting to get involved in your friendship but also I love that two adults were like actually this is not acceptable that these two are not getting along. You know how I love diplomacy so this makes me really happy because we've talked so much on tour about how part of the issue of friendship is there's not societal support or social support for it. And so seeing these two moms say like "Okay, here is our way of dealing with this," this is really inspiring me. I love it.

(16:15)

Ann: And also a real reminder that not just in teen years but at all kinds of points it is really helpful to have someone outside the friendship say "What are you two doing? Get it together. [Laughter] Maybe you need to actually have a direct conversation about this, you know?" And this is something that -- what this evoked for me is the questions that we've gotten about what do you do if you can't afford or access therapy with a friend? Or what do you do if you know you need some kind of outside guidance? And the event that we did with Glory Edim of Well-Read Black Girl, you know, she had mentioned that she had had an experience recently where a third party, a friend who knew both her and a friend she was kind of having some communication trouble with intervened and was like okay, let's all three of us sit down and I'm going to ask you both questions and I'm going to kind of run this conversation in a way that allows you to vocalize things in a way that you're not able to say to each other. That to me is similar to the moms here being like all right, let's get you in the same room and figure out what's going on here, it's like the mediation model for figuring out a friendship rift.

Aminatou: Let's take a break. Let's take a break and come back and listen to some more voicemails.

[Ads]

(18:50)

Listener: Hi Aminatou and Ann, I wanted to share a challenge experience I had with a good friend of mine, someone who I am in big friendship with. Margaret and I met in Bogota, Colombia about eight-and-a-half years ago and we clicked instantly. We started going out together. We were working in the same school. We passed school supplies to each other through our students. It's very cute. And we even had a lot of friends in common so we had this really vibrant group of friends.

One of the things that I immediately noticed about Margaret that I loved -- that I still love -- is she is very intentional. So she was very intentional about how much Spanish she wanted in her life in Bogota, Colombia. By this point she had lived in other Spanish-speaking countries but she had very clear intentions about how much Spanish she wanted in her life when we met.

(19:55)

Margaret is white. I'm half-Latina. She has class privilege, white privilege. She's got all the privileges. I don't. My privilege is resiliency against the shit, the bullshit. [Laughs] This is all to say that a year-and-a-half into the friendship I sent her a very mindless text saying I had -- I didn't want to feel used for my Spanish skills. That I had been feeling pressured to speak Spanish in our friendship and I didn't want to do that anymore. It was so mindless and I'm sure it was incredibly hurtful for Margaret because it's the first time she heard it -- she heard about this -- and I'm trying to be compassionate to my younger self. And we sat about it and we talked about it.

But what I now, thinking back and having done a lot of work with her and on myself as well, I didn't hold myself accountable for the resentment that I was feeling about all of the privilege that she had even when she was responsible or she acknowledged it which is her stuff. But I feel like I didn't step into my . . . I didn't hold my stuff. And I also didn't have language. I didn't know how to say what I was feeling. Now I can. Now we can because we've talked about it and we've caused -- we've talked about the past and when it comes up in real-time now we can do that. But at the time it was just really challenging to figure out what it was that I was feeling about her privilege in relation to my marginalized experience.

(21:55)

I would say . . . I'm happy to say we've done a lot of work in this area and there's still more to be done of course but I'm confident. We're definitely in a good place. Since then we've traveled together. Since then we've had so many experiences and these kinds of dynamics have come up and we've shown up to the best of our ability. And I love her. She's the homie! Like I want to do this work with her and I really resonated with what you guys shared in your most recent episode about just how fantastic and beautiful these kinds of friendships could be but also how challenging and how much work you have to put into these friendships so thank you. Thank you for what you do. We're huge fans of the pod -- talking about her like she's my partner. [Laughs] We're huge fans. We love you guys. We're reading your book and we hope to see you on the Internet. Bye!

Ann: Ugh, yeah, this message. I think that this really gets to the heart of the fact that two people can be in dialogue and yet the experience can be very much not parallel even though you are both talking to each other.

Aminatou: You know, the other thing that I love about this message too is just really taking stock of kind of your own bullshit and just saying like oh man, we were young and we didn't know what we were doing. I don't know, being able to have that kind of thoughtfulness and also just like, you know, having some compassion for your younger selves I think is so, so, so important and not letting every past behavior dictate expectations for the future is really what I love about this letter. I think that the people in this friendship are allowing for each other to grow and to change, you know? And that is not something that either of them would've been able to have if they had just quit this friendship when it was really hard and it sounds like it was really hard in a place where your identity is challenged which is deeply painful. So I don't know, this is giving me a lot of feelings. I appreciate this a lot.

(24:25)

Ann: And also this piece of it about not having a language for things that are coming up in your friendship, you know? The story that I write about in the book which was one of my first experiences with having a friend who is not white point out a huge and glaring thing that I was missing that was causing pain to other people around me or had the potential to, you know, when he read the book he wrote me a really thoughtful email where he was like "Listen, I actually have a lot of compassion for both of us in these early college years because I don't think either of us had a full and robust language for what was really happening. And even though we were trying our best and we were having conversations around this the thing I'm struck most by is how much the conversation around how to talk about these things both in an interpersonal way and on this big picture social level has evolved since then." That makes me excited about what is possible. What are the conversations and things we don't have language for right now that we are collectively working on finding words and labels and shorthands for to help us get there? Should we listen to another one?

Aminatou: Yeah.

Stacy: Hi this is Stacy. I'm calling from New York and yes you can use this on the show. I'm calling in to share a story of friendship ghosting that's been really hard for me to get closure on. In the few years after college I merged a few of my friend groups, specifically one of my best friends from college and one of my best friends from work. Both were women who I spent many hours a week with and over a few years we all became really close and while the two of them would occasionally hang out without me there was a pang of FOMO but ultimately I was happy that we were all friends.

(26:05)

About three years into this merged friend group my college friend completely ghosted me. First I wouldn't hear back from her texts then I'd get a one-line excuse then one day all of a sudden I just never heard from her again. Fast-forward it's been almost two years. I was completely ghosted by this friend and my work friend I guess ended up picking her side. In what I don't know. They've both since been to each other's weddings. I have no contact with either of them. This is the most hurt I've ever felt in a friendship. These were women who I expected all of us to be each other's bridesmaids. It hurt way more than a romantic breakup. I guess my question is how do you get over a friend breakup when you don't have any closure?

Aminatou: Oh man this is really breaking my heart.

Ann: I know!

Aminatou: It's so heavy, you know? And it's so . . . it's something that we need to talk about more because I hear this person, like Stacy, your lack of closure is so deeply painful. I think that there's so many reasons that friendships end in this way and even hearing this note is really causing me to reexamine my own behavior truly and my own -- the ways that I have ended friendship, you know? And the ways that friendships have been ended with me. And this person is right. It hurts so much more than . . . sometimes it hurts so much more than romantic relationships and I think that part of the reason is because in romantic relationships in order to break up you actually have to break up, you know? It doesn't make it easier or better but I think that there is a definitive sense of okay, this is not working out that is somehow psychologically easier to handle than never knowing at all. And I just like . . . I really hope that we start to live in a world where we make it normal to have conversations about these friend breakups because I could read books and books and books and listen to podcasts and podcasts and watch so many TV episodes about how you navigate this because it's a lot and I feel really heavy about this.

(28:30)

Ann: Right. You know, one thing that is so difficult about this is because of the lack of direct conversation about it Stacy doesn't know the whole story. They might understand that hey I've been cut out here but whether it is some kind of Mean Girls intentional like ugh, we don't want to hang out with Stacy anymore versus whether it's something like the other friends felt was "happening naturally" I think there are a lot of stories that people on both sides of this scenario tell themselves in order to kind of duck a really difficult or painful conversation. And I know we have both been on both sides of that. And it is, I guess other than really affirming the fact that this is hurtful and hard it is . . . it's really hard to know what to say to someone in this position.

Aminatou: I hear you. I hear you. You know, let's talk about it more because clearly the pain is there.

Ann: Okay let's listen to another one.

Brianna: Hi ladies, my name is Brianna and I'm from Los Angeles. I'm calling because I'm wondering how you go about having a conversation with your best friend when there's one that may not be speaking every single day and for yourself it's something they don't feel is necessary but it's great of course to still catch up maybe one or two times a week. How do you make sure you still have that friendship moving forward even when you have different communication needs? This best friend is also my older sister and truly one of the most important people in my life so it's really important that we have these conversations moving forward.

(30:15)

Ann: Ugh, communication styles. [Laughs]

Aminatou: Whew, whew.

Ann: It is true that because of the thing that I was saying earlier about each friendship having its own rules and its own specific operating agreement it can be true that what feels like overcommunicating or totally good in one friendship feels like not enough or insufficient or just superficial in another friendship. You know, it doesn't necessarily translate. You can have your own personal communication preferences but I find I actually do change in relation to the people I'm in the friendship with.

Aminatou: I think so too, you know? Also this is so awkward. It's such an awkward conversation to have sometimes because if you really think about it it's truly like one person saying "One way that I feel loved is by talking to you every single day" which is so lovely, you know? Like in itself is such a lovely, lovely, lovely, lovely sentiment you know? But being really honest about your own capacity to just be around people and be social.

I'm thinking about that so much especially in the pandemic, you know? That hard line of like okay, I need some alone time versus I need to be around or I need to be in communication with people is something that in this time it's such a delicate and weird balance. You know, I love this kind of conundrum because at the end of the day it really is like oh yeah, if you're fighting you're fighting because you just love each other so much, you know? And so I think that that's worth remembering.

(31:54)

Ann: Right. And even this question of how do you make sure you have that friendship moving forward and still be as tight as ever, if you are actually considering that question together like I think you're going to be okay no matter where you net out. That is really . . . the fact that you're both interested in that question is extremely heartening I think.

Aminatou: Okay let's listen to one last voice memo.

Camille: Hi Ann, Aminatou, and Gina. My name is Camille. I'm calling from San Francisco. Basically I'm calling in with an advice question about a big friendship I'm in with four other women. We became friends in middle school and have stayed friends to this day but kind of throughout there's been a dynamic where one member of the friendship has caused conflict repeatedly. She has some habits of dishonesty and self-centeredness that have kind of become pain points at various points throughout the friendship. When we were younger we dealt with it the best we could which was not that great but now that we're older we're thinking about this is a very intentional friendship, that it takes time, money, and emotional labor to continue to invest in and I'm willing to do that with all the members of this group but the one who is often the source of conflict. So now the rest of us are in this predicament where we're trying to figure out how to break up with her essentially in the least hurtful way possible. It sucks because I know she considers us her close friends still but I think I and the rest of the girls in the group are really at a place where we're not willing to spend money on a plane ticket to go see her or include her in big life events like weddings or engagements that are coming up. So yeah, we're trying to figure out how to disinvest from this friendship that no longer serves us without too many hurt feelings.

(33:55)

Ann: Ugh, group dynamics! Oh! [Laughs]

Aminatou: Tell me about it. Man, group dynamics are tough man. Like, you know, because [Sighs] . . . and again it depends on who is in the group and it depends on where you're at and it depends on how you communicate. You know, I can think of very good group dynamics that you and I have been a part o and I can think of very not great group dynamics that you and I have been a part of and it's just . . . it's so tough. It's so, so tough and I think that it's . . . when you consider that people's feelings actually do get hurt it's important to resolve and think about.

Ann: Yeah. And one thing that strikes me about this scenario as well is three o the friends have identified one friend as a source of conflict. And I think one thing I would just challenge this listener to think about is both in terms of how you talk about it but maybe in terms of how you think about it, like that could be true. People can create conflict. But there is also a world in which maybe the way that three of these friends have grown and changed and the preferences they have for communication are creating conflict with this one friend. You know, everyone is part of a dynamic that is not working versus one person is creating conflict.

And I think the kind of three-to-one ratio happening here makes it like oh, if the three of us are not in conflict with each other and everything's going find and conflict occurs with this one person then they are the source versus actually let's look at some of the bigger ways that maybe we changed or the preferences that the three of us share that are not lining up with this other friend that are creating tension. Because that to me feels like more of an opening for conversation than you're always starting conflict and we want to break up. That feels a little different to me than hey, this feels really easy for the three of us and things don't feel easy in our friendship with you. That fundamentally seems to suggest that you are taking some ownership of a dynamic that is not working.

(36:10)

Aminatou: Right, you know? And I think also trying to communicate the same thing. The three friends need to communicate the same things to each other that they're communicating to this fourth friend because I think so many times so much gets lost in translation. I hear this caller, I'm like oh yeah, this person has this perceived habit of dishonesty and self-centeredness and I wonder what it looks like if you actually tell that person hey, this is how you are being perceived in our group but we are willing to hear what might be the cause of that right? Because it's very possible there's some sort of very good reason for why that's the perception. And I'm like I don't know, maybe the dynamic really is not working but I think that it's important when you are friends in a group both to examine your one-on-one relationship with this person but also try to present the group dynamic as honestly as possible and communicate the same things to each other as you were communicating with the person. It's always nice to be the one in the in group but I think that a lot of times it gets lost the fact that having other people reinforce your belief or your sense that you are communicating well, you know, it doesn't necessarily mean that's what's going on. You are just reinforcing the same norms for each other if that makes sense.

Ann: Right. No it totally makes sense. And, you know, speaking of things being reinforced I can also imagine a scenario -- and I know this voice memo does not have details that go this deep -- but I can imagine a scenario in which this kind of odd friend out felt threatened and is therefore reacting maybe more dramatically or stoking more conflict than they otherwise would because they can sense this dynamic where they are kind of the odd one out. It's got this kind of . . . it's exacerbating the dynamic, you know? It just keeps doubling down on this three-against-one feeling that clearly has not been openly acknowledged. And so I think that's part of it too is I don't know how bad things have gotten right now but this sense that what would it look like if this fourth person felt more secure in the friend group? Maybe the dynamic between them and the others would not be so fraught. Possibly that they are . . . I don't know. There have definitely been times in my life when I am acting out because I feel threatened and I don't even clock that's what's going on. I sense some kind of instability or some lack of intimacy and my behavior reflects that in ways that are not even top-of-mind for me, you know? So I don't know. I think there is something too about the group dynamics, almost prophetic, like coming more and more true the more that the three of them are like "This person is a source of conflict," the more that person becomes alienated and the more that dynamic becomes negative.

(39:10)

Aminatou: Wow you are so wise Ann Friedman. How lucky am I?

Ann: Oh my god. I mean the only reason we can talk about this stuff is because we have messed up every single one of these situations ourselves. [Laughs]

Aminatou: Every single one of them. I'm like guilty, guilty, guilty. Throw away the key.

Ann: Fully charged in the court of friendship with not doing it perfectly every time. [Laughs]

Aminatou: Whew, so real. So real. I really loved hearing those voice memos. Thank you so much to everyone who called in. Thank you to everyone who stuck around for Summer of Friendship. It's been very heartening for me.

Ann: I know. Yeah, and standard plug you can buy Big Friendship wherever you get your books, preferably an indie, or you can request it from your local library. We love checking up on the waitlist in libraries for our book because that is a comparable sales number that we're like ooh. Feeling popular at the library is like wow, a dream come true you know?

Aminatou: Truly, truly, truly. Hey Ann Friedman, I hope you have a good rest of your weekend. Is there anything else you want me to know?

Ann: Wait. Wait stop. [Laughs] Yeah, we also have put together a reading and discussion guide which you could use it for a book club if you do something formal like that but you could also find it on our website and use it as a discussion tool if you just and one other friend are reading Big Friendship. It does not have to be a formal for book clubs only, but you can find that at bigfriendship.com as well.

Aminatou: Okay perfect. I will see you on the Internet.

Ann: See you on the Internet.

Aminatou: Bye boo-boo.

Ann: Bye.

Aminatou: Anyway, you can find us many places on the Internet: callyourgirlfriend.com, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, we're on all your favorite platforms. Subscribe, rate, review, you know the drill. You can call us back. You can leave a voicemail at 714-681-2943. That's 714-681-CYGF. You can email us at callyrgf@gmail.com. Our theme song is by Robyn, original music composed by Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs. We're on Instagram and Twitter at @callyrgf. Our producer is Jordan Bailey and this podcast is produced by Gina Delvac.
Call Your Girlfriend