Friendship (and Bluey)

My son, Lukas really loves the show Bluey. If you are not familiar, it’s a children’s cartoon from Australia about a dog named Bluey who lives with her little sister, Bingo, and their mom and dad. It’s a really cute show that strategically places teaching moments alongside funny jokes that parents will enjoy too. We have been watching this show on a loop lately and most of the episodes end in some sweet and emotional way that makes me and my husband cry. Lukas thinks this is very entertaining and as the show ends he always looks to us to see if we are tearing up.

“This is sad right, mom?” he asks as the emotive music plays and the end credits roll.

There is one episode in particular called “Daddy Dropoff” that I can’t get through without feeling a lump in my throat. It’s not even that the episode is sad, it’s just that the final scene of the show is so sweet and relatable to me.

In this episode, the Dad has to drop the kids off at school but the girls make him play so many games that they end up running very late. Eventually, Bingo makes it to her kindergarten class and meets another dog named Lila who is there for her first day at the school. They end the episode by playing a montage of Bingo and Lila growing up together as best friends and it destroys me every time. 

I met one of my best friends on our first day of kindergarten. I remember walking up and introducing myself to her at age four. She is still my best friend today and we’ve been through many of life’s important moments together. All of them, really. I have a fairly small, tight knit group of friends. My two closest friendships were established before I turned 9 years old. To make things even more wholesome, I met my husband when we were both seven years old. My two best friends, my husband and I all went to school together and we’re all still really close.  

I know my situation is rare but I can’t help but think about it when I watch my son with his friends. Lukas is five years old and over the last couple of years he’s developed his own friendships with neighbours, classmates from school and some of my friends’ children. I try to capture moments with his friends through pictures and videos for him to have later on because I wish I had more of that stuff from my childhood. I’m always thinking that he might show these photos at his wedding one day with his buddies by his side. Preferably, he’ll marry one of my friends’ kids.  Hmmm… I might be getting ahead of myself there a little bit.

Now that I’m older, I know how hard it is to maintain adult friendships. When you are a kid, much of your life is centered on your friends and even more so when you’re a teenager. I used to love summers when I knew I would get together with my friends during the day and then talk to them on the phone all night. When I was teenager my mom would get out of bed late at night and pick up the phone, just to see if I was on the line. Half asleep she’d growl, “HANG UP THE PHONE AND GO TO BED!” Sometimes I would sit on the phone with my girlfriend while we watched the newest episode of Dawson’s Creek in real time. We’d be chatting away about Pacey and Joey as my Dad would mumble something about his disdain for the show.

“Kids in real life don’t talk anything like that,” he’d grumble as he cleared the dining room table behind me.

My friends and I are very different people and luckily, our differences seem to balance everything out. As teens, I would describe one of us (not me) as athletic, driven and academic. I would describe the other (also not me) as kind, stylish and popular. I would describe myself as self-deprecating, neurotic and thoughtful.  

My super-smart, athletic friend has always showed compassion for my shortcomings and celebrated my wins. She cheered me on at our softball games when I was a nervous wreck in the batter’s box. She also tried to guide me through high school math equations, and when that proved to be impossible, she helped me envision future career choices that didn’t involve math.

One of the most memorable things she did for me was when I went to Florida for a week with my family. Ahead of time, she wrote me a note for every single day that I would be away so I could read them on the trip and not miss her as much. She also wrote me letters to read when I returned, outlining the daily events that I missed at school and exactly what my crush was wearing each day so I didn’t miss a thing.

My sweet and popular friend has been an emotional anchor for me for as long as I can remember. It started pretty early on that we’d discuss almost every decision we made with each other first. There was a time when we talked endlessly about hair styles, clothing and boy stuff and now it’s all mostly about what groceries we should buy and how to take care of our gardens. When I first found out I was pregnant with my son I texted her a picture of my positive pregnancy test before I showed my husband (oops).

As I’ve gotten older I have found that friendships fall lower on the priority list, positioned well below kids, careers and partners. When you are a parent with school aged kids there is so much to think about and endless tasks to complete all the time. My husband and I don’t usually sit down until nine o’clock at night and by then I’m ready to pass out. I’m lucky now if I get to see my friends once a month and I hate talking on the phone as an adult so I almost never do that. It takes a lot more effort to maintain friendships later in life. You have to sneak in special moments where you can.

During the thick of the pandemic, like many others, we saw our friends even less than usual. We had to make a greater effort to find times to meet outside where it was safe. That was especially difficult in the colder months. One night in the late fall, my friend invited us over for drinks around a fire. Knowing that fall is my favourite time of the year, my friend set up her backyard with all the pumpkins, candles and cozy blankets she could find. It was the most fun we had had in a long time.  

With my oldest friends, it’s easy to pick up where we left off, even if it has been a few months. This is why I feel very fortunate to have established such strong bonds with them early on. When you’ve been through that much together, you’re just on a different level. It may seem a bit childish to still use the term “Best Friend” at this age but that’s just what they are. The best.

Until recently, I hadn’t really thought about the new friendships that I might make at this point in my life. Because of Lukas, I now have a whole new group of friends that I affectionately call my “mom friends”. These friends have opened me up to new experiences, taught me things about parenthood and have been supportive in a whole new way. This dynamic group is often part of my day to day life because of our connection with our children. That, inadvertently, presents its own challenges. Because this group of friends all have boys around the same age as Lukas I find myself, sometimes subconsciously, comparing my child and my parenting skills to theirs.

There’s a Bluey episode for that too.

The episode is called “Baby Race” and it perfectly summarizes what it’s like to be part of a “mom group”.  The show is focused on Bluey’s mom, Chilli, as she remembers her oldest daughter and her friend, Judo, when they were babies. While Bluey learned how to roll over first, Judo was the first to crawl, which led to a “baby race” in Chilli’s mind, to see which baby would walk first.

The internalized competitiveness that Chilli exhibits in this episode is so relatable. I feel very strongly that being friends with other moms is helpful and for the most part, for me, these friendships have been very positive. However, watching this episode made me think about how unreasonable it is that I have ever felt competitive over milestones and self-critical of my parenting choices. A lot of times, if my child isn’t doing the exact same thing at the same time as his peers, I feel that I’m doing something wrong or not doing enough. I know I’m not alone in that feeling. When I take a step back, I can see that in reality, motherhood is just continuously navigating new things that I’ve never experienced before. And usually, my child does what he needs to do, when he’s ready to do it.

At the end of the episode, when Chilli is feeling deflated, one of the mom friends, Bella, comes to visit. Bella reveals that she doesn’t have it all figured out either, in spite of having 9 children of her own. She is reassuring and sympathetic and just what Chilli needs. Bella represents the ultimate, supportive friend and I’m lucky to have those in abundance.