Friend date

There are some things you promise yourself will never happen to you. You hear other people talk about them and fancy yourself immune. Things like marriage, culture shock or food poisoning. Things people write articles that you smuggly read and think I would never be in that position.

But here I am, writing my own post. In high school and university I would stumble upon articles about how it’s harder to meet people and make friends once you leave the comforts of forced interaction with people who are exactly like you. I thought never will that be me. It’s not hard to make friends and have a solid crew of people. Well, the smugness is gone and I find myself adjusting to post university life.

Things are harder now. I can’t just waltz into the office of the nearest student club when I feel like some hangouts. Couches and a microwave are no longer the thing that brings my friends together in one place. We’ve graduated, taken jobs and developed a strange fondness for napping over drinks. We’re no longer a text away able to do nothing all day.

They are no longer a short elevator ride away. We’ve dispersed. Some people moved away, some people moved in with boyfriends or girlfriends never to be seen again.

There’s also the weird divide between the still students and the 9 to 5 crowd. Plans that start at 10:30 p.m. on a week night are no longer my go to and I have drifted from my friends who still live like that.

There is work a place where I sit in proximity to several other people for eight hours each day. I like my coworkers but once we leave that’s it. There’s a wall between work life and social life.

These days I find myself wishing for a new crowd and a new way of getting the people I know together at the same place and time. I find myself wondering how to go about making friends in your 20s. I find myself sounding exactly like all of those articles and wanting to hunt them for gems of wisdom.