Make new friends, but keep the old...

Last week I had the opportunity to spend the day with some of my coworkers outside of the office.  It is always nice to spend some time together outside the cubical walls. Thanks to the extra day off work, we were able to engage in some long overdue girly goodness.  

I started the day off painting ceramics at Petroglyph Ceramics Lounge with my gal pal Regan.  Painting at Petroglyph is a really fun and relaxing way to spend the afternoon.  The studio is fully equipped with a variety of ceramics, paints, and supplies for you to choose from.  Sometimes I spend more time picking out what I want to paint, than I actually do painting it.   This visit I decided to paint a dish for my rings that are growing increasingly tight around my fingers.  Sooner or later I won’t be able to get my wedding ring on and off and it will have a cozy place to rest until my fingers are less swollen.  Regan is a Petroglpyh master and is much more patient and thorough than I am.  In the time it took me to paint my small dish, she painted an entire ceramic owl as a birthday gift for one of her friends.  The hardest part about painting at Petroglyph is waiting for your piece to be finished.  For those of you who need immediate gratification, this process would drive you mad.  Once you are finished with your piece, you leave it at the studio for them to fire and glaze.  Usually this take no more than a week, but when you are really excited about seeing the finished product, it can seem longer. 

My wonky dish

After painting, we jetted off to Shana Thai Restaurant which is one of my all-time favorite Thai Restaurants in Mountain View.  I’m pretty sure the reason for my unwavering love of Shana is their Pumpkin Curry.   I love everything pumpkin, but it reaches a euphoric state when it comes in the form of curry! We met up with Mary (a current coworker) and Linda (a previous coworker) for Thai goodness and long overdue chance to catch up on life.  Between the four of us, we have managed to hit the gamete of big life experiences just within this last year:  a new boyfriend, starting grad school, getting a new job, moving, engagement, wedding planning, pregnancy, etc.  It has been a big year for us all! 

PAIRE ladies, past and present

Not that I have forgotten, but with days like this I am always reminded of how important friendships truly are.  When else do you get to laugh, cry, complain, commiserate, confess, make fun of each other, talk, talk and talk and then cry some more within the supportive arms of friends?  If you are lucky enough to have a mate in life with which you can do these things, than that is a gift in and of itself.  I am one of those lucky ones (in more ways than this).  I feel truly blessed to have such supportive friends to share my life with, both current and old. There are times when I count on my friends to tell me how it is and there are times when I count on them to tell me what I want to hear.  Most of the time they are great at knowing which I need. And there are times when your friends can tell you things that your mate just can’t (or won’t).  And there are times when just being in the company of a good friend is all you need. Social relationships like these are what make life worth sharing.

I realized recently that a large majority of my social interaction comes from work.  Most of my good girl friends don’t live in San Jose or even the bay area.   At one point, we had a great group of friends that lived near us, but those friends have since move away.  And of the friends that are still living nearby, not one of them is a parent.  Sometimes I worry that during the time I am home with the baby, I will feel isolated.  I have always assumed that I will love staying home with the baby, but there is a part of me that wonders if it will be harder than I think.  Will it be too exhausting?  Will I be able to handle the constant needs of an infant? And what about the non-existent “me” time?  Can I handle giving my life over to an infant for a year (plus)? What about my career and my hobbies? Will I ever be able to make time for my friends? And will they still want to hang out with me? I don’t intend to let my friendships fall to the wayside, but I know that the demands of parenting often take precedence.  If not physically then emotionally.  When you become a parent, you have baby on the brain.  I’ve seen it time and time again.  New parents cannot help themselves but ooze over their child 24/7.  I don’t expect my non-parent friends to want to talk about how long the baby slept or how many bowl movements it had or which stroller brand is best.  I can say that I will never become this person, but I know better.  I would like to hope that I will be able to maintain some resemblance of my former self and be able to put baby aside for time with my friends. But this will be my life. There is no shame or blame in that, and as a new parent you get a little wiggle room. Let’s just say that I know this will be a work in progress.  With time, I’m sure I’ll get the hang of it.

Of course nothing makes friends like having a baby.  There are plenty of parenting groups, social activities and other opportunities to meet people who have kids, especially in the bay area.  I am sure that we will be able make new, and just as fulfilling, relationships with other parents, and this will help if and when I do start to feel isolated.  All this to say that I certainly don’t expect that life to stay exactly the same, but I hope that this change will be a good change – for my family, for my marriage and for myself.  Like the saying goes, “Make new friends but keep the old”, except I don’t consider some silver and some gold.  Friends come in and out of our lives for a reason, and I believe each one has always been gold.