Dear Nina,
In your answer from early February, you mentioned cross generational friendships and how much those friendships enhance our lives. I’d like to know if you can expound on that a bit.
Here’s my situation: I’m a single woman in my 50s, never married, no kids. My personality is around 30% boho / philosopher / artist, by which I mean that I’m pretty free-spirited and am open to meeting other free spirits living in a buttoned-down world. In doing so, I’ve met a couple of women in their 20s who have blown me away with their kindness, depth, wisdom, and generosity of spirit toward me.
These are women who call and text me often, invite themselves over to hang out and chat and genuinely seem to enjoy spending time with me. This is great, right?
But there’s always this part of me that feels conflicted, because I do feel more responsibility toward my younger friends than I would, say, a 50 year-old peer. I’m constantly trying to be aware of their burgeoning life experiences (and they are constantly amazing me with how insightful they are, even if the life experience doesn’t measure up).
I wish I didn’t feel guilty about my sincere friendship with these lovely humans. I met one friend’s mother recently. She was my age and seemed like a great woman. She and her daughter and I talked for an hour and ended our meeting with a hug. Now I feel bad when her daughter (my friend) calls me and wants to go to dinner with me, alone. I project jealousy on her mom and then I have funky feelings, like not only am I having an age-inappropriate relationship, but I’m trying to steal someone’s daughter!
At the end of the day, can you remind me why intergenerational friendships are valid and good? Thank you, Nina!
Signed, Feeling Conflicted
Dear Feeling Conflicted,
I can see why you’re attracting friends of various ages. You sound open, fun, self-aware, and giving. I enjoyed reading your letter, which happened to arrive in my inbox a week or two before I saw an article in the Wall Street Journal titled “Friendship’s Power Across Generations” by Clare Ansberry. You’re not the only one thinking about this topic!
Ansberry reports, “Nearly four in 10 adults, both men and women, have a close friend at least 15 years older or younger than they are, according to a 2019 AARP survey.”
I have close friends five to 12 years older than I am and close friends who are about five years younger. I like that I have these different friends in my life, but I haven’t experienced a close non-family relationship with quite the spread you’re talking about here. Since I remember my mom having such a friend for several decades, I asked her to read your question and report back.
Kathy (my mom): “I don’t know that she should worry about the friend’s mom being jealous. If you had a friend my age, would I care? I’m just happy for my kids to have friends.”
Nina: “It wouldn’t bother you at all?”
Kathy: “I don’t think so. Your sister has a friend who’s close to my age. I think it’s nice.”
My mom went on to tell me about a close friend of hers who was 25 years older.
“To be honest, I felt like I was often in the position of giving her advice,” my mom said. “She died when she was 100. We were still in touch. I’d visit her even when she was in a senior living facility. We had lunch not too long before she died. I would pick her up, along with her oxygen tank, we’d talk over lunch about the same types of topics we discussed in the earlier years: her former work as an analyst, her memories of living in Europe, current events. She was sharp to the end. She’d give lectures at the senior center where she lived. I attended a few and was the youngest person there by far. Every year for her birthday she’d invite 15 women to dinner, and I was one of them. They were an interesting group. She had a few other younger friends, too. It’s important to have friends, no matter the age. You can learn things from everyone. My advice to your letter writer is that she should enjoy the friendships.”
I think my mom’s point at the end about learning from everyone highlights a major benefit from these friendships. You’re going to get exposure to ideas and to other people from friends across generations in a way that’s less likely if everyone was born within the same few years. That exposure and learning goes in both directions. We learn from friends who older and younger than us.
And the truth is, when you have good chemistry, I wouldn’t spend any time worrying about whether it’s a less typical friendship path. I receive so many letters from lonely individuals out there struggling to connect. If what you’re doing is working, I say take any conflicted feelings and talk yourself out of them. Those feelings aren’t serving you, but the friendships are!
My mom and I agree—you’re doing great in the friendship department and it’s something to celebrate.
Thanks for writing, Nina
Photo by Lala Azizli on Unsplash
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