Quote:
Originally Posted by Phrozen Sands
I can agree that there are some similarities to greek life, but still very different in some ways. I’m still to this day close to my frat brothers I pledged with and some of them I was in school with. We still stay in touch. But I think the interest in a particular organization can bring lifelong friends together. I think I’d be leery if some random I met at a seminar or an event came up to me asking if I wanted to be in a friend group. I think I’d be bothered by that and decline.
I think the reason for the the decline of close friends is because people are either on their phones or laptops. People really don’t even talk to each other anymore. I believe that’s part of the problem with that.
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Its an interesting concept and I think she's got some valid points. I think in my own experience there are a lot of factors with friendships. I remember someone once telling me that people are in your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. I thought that was absurd, but the older I have gotten I've seen it more in my own world.
I think geography has a lot to do with the general cultures and how people operate. I've been in some social situations that the people were very insular, if you didn't grow up in x part of the world you didn't quite fit in, and people made little effort to try and get to know you. Where I live a lot of people come and go mostly for work they start here and then a lot of times the move back closer to their family etc.
And "friendships mean different things to different people" which can be tough. A long time ago I was taking class at community college since I was transferring schools, I sort of befriended this other young lady in my class, and she seemed to have this entourage of minions with her. We were cool, and she invited me to a party, I agreed to go but then my mom ended up in the hospital and I spent most of the day with my mom. I get home later, back in the day of landlines. She calls me and reads me the riot act. I apologized for bailing and tried to explain the situation with my mom but clearly she didn't care. That was the end of that, thankfully it was towards the end of the semester so not to much more time for being weird.
I think with any relationship it does help if people are transparent with their expectation of others. Later, I went with a good friend to a going away thing her friends were throwing her. One of her co-workers who was a lot of fun said her goodbyes to her friend but was very frank and said listen I am bad about keeping in touch so while I still consider you a friend don't expect me to call in and keep up. Ive got too much on my plate. My friend was a bit hurt by it, but I thought to myself wow, good for the co-worker to be very up front about it, versus letting things wither on the vine, I'm just putting it out there.
A lesson I tell my friends who I still consider friends, I do warn them that I am bad about keeping up which is true, but I do tell them that just because I'm not regularly checking in doesn't mean you are far from my heart, actually you're quite close.
The friendship ceremony thing though...yeah that would be a big red flag!
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