Repotting friendships
Look in any direction in my house and you’ll see a potted plant. I have a garden window full of succulents, spider plants, and Swedish ivy in my bedroom, a peace lily in the living room, Dieffenbachia in the dining room, and pothos everywhere. You would think I would be a plant pro and would have watering schedules and repotting days to keep the plants healthy and invigorated, but I’m not very attentive. I water them when I remember and haven’t repotted them in over 4 years. It’s recommended to repot plants every 12-18 months.
My plants aren’t thriving but they’re not dying either. They’re somewhere in between… they’re existing.
One day while looking at my leggy succulents, I realized that my friendships felt quite similar.
They exist but I’m not as attentive as I could be. I text when I remember to, about once a month, and it’s usually just to figure out logistics for hanging out: “Hey! Are you free to hang out soon? Here are dates I’m available....”
That’s why when the New York Times put out a 5-day friendship challenge, I jumped on it. The Day 1 challenge was to text a friend to let them know you’re thinking about them. Simple right? Not for me. I overthought it: Who would I text? What would I say? This feels too random.
I ran through a list of potential candidates:
My mom? No, I text her almost every day.
My husband? No, that’s not in the spirit of the activity.
A mom friend? No way, we don’t have that type of relationship.
My brother? He’ll think something’s up because we don’t chat like that.
I decided to text one of my best friends from college who I’ve known for over 15 years. I pulled up her name on my phone and then froze. I realized she and I don’t casually text. We only text when trying to work out the logistics to hang out. Would she think I’m weird if I randomly text her? What would I even say?
I texted her but took the easy way out, sticking to our usual logistics texting, “Hey! How’s it going? Want to hang out soon?” I still technically completed the Day 1 challenge...
This led nicely into Day 2 of the challenge: repot a friendship. This is where you take a friendship from its typical context and put it in a different one, just like when you repot a plant: take it out of its pot, add new soil, and possibly put it in a bigger pot.
After my logistics-laden text to my friend, I asked if she would be up for hanging out a different way. Instead of our usual lunch or dinner together, I suggested meeting at a park and bringing our kids along – a playdate for everyone.
She loved this idea and soon we found ourselves at a park chatting the morning away while our kids played tag, ate snowballs, and built dirt castles.
I had so much fun hanging out with my long-time friend in an entirely new way that I challenged myself to repot another friendship. This time I asked an acquaintance, the mom of my son’s friend, if she wanted to hang out sometime. I was nervous. I felt like I was asking someone on a date, something I hadn’t done in over 20 years.
I started typing my text in Apple Notes so I could workshop it. I typed my first draft one night and then slept on it. I looked at it again the next day and revised it, making sure I didn’t seem too desperate or weird for asking the question: Do you want to hang out sometime?
I hit send and tried not to check my phone constantly. I tensed with every ping, expecting a rejection of some sort: too busy or not interested.
Thankfully it didn’t take long for the, “Heck yeah!” to come back in response. Phew!
We figured out logistics and went out for drinks a few weeks later. Then she invited my family to meet up with her family to grab coffee along the bike trail for a morning playdate. Then I gave her family some s’mores cookie bars I made. Then she gave me some cut flowers from her garden.
One friendship was reinvigorated by new soil and the other started to grow roots after being put into a new pot.
Day 3 of the challenge was to put a friendship on autopilot, to cut out the burden of logistics. I cheated and checked this one off without doing anything new because I already have a standing hold on my calendar to hang out with a friend every month.
I lost steam on days 4 and 5 because the prompts didn’t really stretch me in new ways like the previous days. Day 4 was to revisit old photos with a friend and Day 5 was to take an emotional risk by being vulnerable with a friend.
Through this challenge, I learned that I’m pretty uncomfortable with changing the status quo of my friendships: randomly checking in or changing the context of a friendship. That’s what feels vulnerable to me. But this challenge also taught me that sometimes things need to change so they can grow. Now if only I would give all my plants the same care and consideration…
Thanks to , , & for invigorating this article with your thoughts and feedback.
The way you over-thought everything was hilarious and relatable. I loved your inner monologue.
Brooke- this made such a stellar transformation! I am obsessed with your plant detail at the beginning!!!