As an empty nester, she had to learn to ‘decorate’ her life with lovely friendships
“I’ve felt this way before.”
Isn’t it curious how an emotion can transport us right back down our personal timelines? Been here, felt that, what did I do then and can I successfully do it again now?
That day, the points in my personal history when I felt this particular emotion flashed across my mind like a super-speed photo montage:
▪ Moving to a new town as a high school sophomore.
▪ Starting college and being assigned an upperclassman roommate with an established social circle that would not include me.
▪ Moving to a different state for work, alone.
▪ Married with children and moving for my husband’s job from one state to another to another.
The situations and versions of myself were all different, but the feeling was the same: a hybrid of loneliness coupled with a weary realization that it was going to take time and energy to overcome it. Every new start left me without a local friend group, and the older I got, the harder it became to fit into one.
I remember when my kids were toddlers and we walked to the park and saw playgroups of mom-friends with their kids. I’m not shy — no one would accuse me of that — but I didn’t possess the chutzpah necessary to walk up to those collections of strangers and introduce myself.
When the kids started school, finding friends became easier and I rode that busy-train for more than 20 years. I had classroom-mom friends, sports-bleacher buddies, extracurricular-activity pals, and bus stop compatriots. When the internet became a part of my life, I slowly cultivated a whole computer full of people with shared interests to chat with. And like deeply cherished life-souvenirs, I had dear friendships that had survived the years and were simply a phone call away.
When my last kid graduated high school and went off to college, I found myself sitting at home, staring at my husband a lot. I missed those in the course of my days, effortless, live-and-in-person relationships.
It was an unanticipated realization of empty-nesting that a lot of my in-person friendships had been kid-activity based and our paths had stopped crossing. That’s when I knew that what had worked before wouldn’t now, and I had to take charge if I wanted hang-out friends.
One day I saw an advertisement for a local craft class. I’m not particularly skilled in anything artsy, but maybe this was a path to socializing.
The store would provide a small wooden house, an abundance of decorating supplies, a teacher to guide us, snacks, beverages and an environment to encourage creativity (read: they handled cleaning up). I reserved two spaces in the next class.
And that’s how a neighborhood driveway-chatter pal and I went and crafted a Valentine’s Day holiday house earlier this year. Neither Mary Jo’s nor my creation was Instagram worthy, but as a social activity, it was a win.
The next month, I took my mother-in law. Stereotypes be darned, I enjoy her company, and it was nice to do something fun that didn’t involve any other family members.
We joked that we would put our garishly decorated St. Patrick’s Day houses on our mantels like they were fine art and see what our husbands said. We were not disappointed.
The month after that, I invited a met-online friend, Other Susan, who lives nearby. By this point, my tiny wooden house decorating skills were starting to develop, and that Easter cottage is still on display in my living room.
A year ago, I was a parent on the edge of an empty nest. I was wrapped up in the whirlwind end of high school/start of college activities and my life was full of more peopling than ever before. It didn’t occur to me that would end.
But it did. Now I’m not necessarily starting fresh and anew, but refreshing with the valuable materials already in my life as I add another oft-repeated emotion to my timeline: gratitude.
Susan is a Kansas City based writer and podcaster. She is a co-host of the award-winning, long-running women’s history podcast, The History Chicks. Her craft classes were at Re:porium in Kansas City.
