In Defense of Friendship

Part of being a good mom is having a life outside of your child.  I am completely convinced that the other women in my life, my best girlfriends, other mommy friends, my own mother, are who keep me sane and happy-they make me a better mom and they keep my brain active, and on most days I’m convinced that my brain is melting into some kind of oatmeal like consistency-without the cinnamon sugar goodness.  So when something bad happens to one of my besties, I get angry. More and more I also find myself going into mom mode and getting very protective, and I assume that it will only get worse over time.

I have this friend.  Let’s call her Emily (I don’t know why I chose Emily-I think I’m just upset that Revenge is on hiatus). Emily and I have been friends for a long time, through break ups and make ups and immaturity and now, as adults, through very grown up-type problems.  She was one of the first people to visit me in the hospital when I had Lily, and even though Emily is a girlie girl through and through, she understood my no tutu and no hair fluff proclamation and she brought presents that she knew that I would love.  Emily is kind and thoughtful and dedicated to her job-which, without giving details, is a pretty damn selfless career-Emily is friends with everyone, regardless of race, religion, socio-economic status, fashion sense, etc, etc…(honestly, I don’t know if she even sees those things).  She’s just not a judgmental person and she always sees the best in everyone; even after people repeatedly let her down, she still gives chances and encouragement (sometimes I want to kick people out of her life for her because people can be mean, but Emily cannot).

Here’s the hitch-Emily is gorgeous.  Very very very gorgeous.  So gorgeous that my father who could never remember any of my friends growing up (we used to play this game where he had to name 5 friends-he always failed), he always remembered Emily.  She’s also crazy talented and outgoing and friendly and chatty and loud and consummately energetic.  She’s the kind of girl that other girls like to hate on-and right now another girl is hating on her, pretty bad. And that girl is her boyfriend’s sister.

I’ve had my fair share of problems with boyfriends’ families.  For some reason their parents never like me, even though the parents of my best guy friends would beg their sons to date me and marry me and make little babies with me (and trust me, my kid is capital ‘c’ cute, so they would’ve been pretty happy).  I’m sure I’m to blame for a lot of it-I’m pretty bad at making new friends and I get very awkward in social situations-sitting back and playing observant mute is my go-to move.  There was one holiday dinner with an ex where I spent the entire time talking to his mother’s best friend about a little-known novel about Jewish immigration in turn of the century New York.  I even faked not knowing how to do my hair in order to have a bonding moment with a different ex’s sister.  I’m pretty sure that one ex’s entire family hated me because of the guy I dated in high school-by that logic I would’ve hated me too-my high school boyfriend was a nutjob and I must’ve seemed very dramatic as a result.  But Emily’s situation is worse.

My exes had the common decency (or just common sense) to NOT tell me about their familial issues-I mean, I could tell, and they could tell, but the issue was more of a no fly zone-just leave it alone and don’t talk about it, and if anyone interrupts the peaceful continuum, there will be hell to pay.  Emily’s ‘mean girl’ is nasty-she grumbles about Emily every chance that she gets…to the boyfriend, to the family…and her complaints: “Emily only talks about herself, Emily is conceited, Emily is self-involved.”  To be fair, yes, Emily does talk about herself, but it’s not braggy or showy at all-Emily does a lot of things and she’s involved in many organizations and clubs-the best stories are when Emily tells you about her day, about what happened at work and then what she did afterwards.  She’s not doing this to pat herself on the back or make sure that you know just how great she is…honestly, Emily doesn’t think that she is great.  She’s ridiculously modest.  And when she’s done telling you her story, Emily wants to hear every detail of your day, even the most basic minutiae are interesting to her.  But this mean girl doesn’t care-she seems to be hell bent on driving a wedge between Emily and her boyfriend, and I think it comes from a variety of reasons. 

Firstly, I don’t think that the mean girl understands that Emily is completely without guile-Emily doesn’t have a single malicious bone in her skinny, toned body.  She isn’t conceited at all, and chances are that you only think that she is because you haven’t gotten to know her.  Which is sad…for you…not for her-trust me when I tell you, your life will be darker without Emily in it.  Secondly, and it’s even more pathetic because it’s true about women in general which makes me want to vomit, but I think the sister is jealous.  Emily is gorgeous and fit and did I mention GORGEOUS.  In high school we used to have the “Emily Test,” when we’d introduce our new boyfriends to Emily and if all they did was stare and start hitting on her, we’d dump them.  She never knew that we did this.  But women get like this-they get super jealous of the pretty girl and then they treat her like crap.  Girl on girl crime…it’s pretty serious.  Thirdly, and I know I’ve been there before (I’m Jewish, and Jewish moms aren’t always too happy to get rid of their precious, princely sons-I swear, being Italian and being Jewish are the same freaking thing), but the mean girl doesn’t seem to want her brother to grow up, get serious with a woman, detach slightly from his family and have his own life.  It’s one thing to not like the person your brother or sister is seeing, but it’s quite another to outwardly and repeatedly bad-mouth that person to your siblings, parents, anyone who will listen, etc...etc...Mean girl has an agenda, and that makes me angry.  Granted, if my sibling was marrying a kid toucher or a sociopath I’d have a lot to say about it, but that’s neither here nor there (my brother-in-law is awesome, by the way).

I’m supposed to stay out of it, but it’s hard.  All I want to do is to defend my friend, who has done nothing wrong-it hurts me that she’s hurt.  I want to have a serious sit down with the mean girl and explain just how judgmental and idiotic she’s being (because, in the long run, she’s only going to damage her relationship with her brother), but I’m supposed to stay out of it.  I sense a similar situation with Lily when she’s a teenager and she gripes to me about a mean girl at school, and of course I’ll know the mother because I’ve already met a lot of the mothers in our town, and Lily will be hurt and crying and then part of me deep down inside will break and my mother rage will kick in.  I’ll be midway through dialing the mother’s number when Lily will tell me to “stay out of it” because I’ll “only make it worse.”  She’ll be right of course-whoever heard of parent involvement actually fixing these kinds of things-but that broken part inside of me won’t heal until Lily heals.  I don’t think I actually healed from adolescence until my mid-20s, so I guess I have a long time to wait until I feel whole again.