THE "MEDIUM FRIEND"

 

Berthe Morisot, TWO GIRLS, 1894

I never heard the phrase "medium friend" before today when I read an article called "The vexing problem of the Medium Friend" by Lisa Miller. I've been thinking about friendship lately.  With loneliness and depression increasing, friends are an important antidote.  We don't want to vex. or be vexed by, our friends

Closest friends by definition cannot test the limits of our time, love or energy.  We love them, we make time for them, we preserve our energy for them. If one thing falls through, we schedule another. Best friends are called that for a reason; they are not second best in our lives.  

Medium friends are also genuine friends.  We laugh together, share news, bring insights and perhaps expertise to one another.  We share a history of neighborhood, work or school, or have similar interests.  There are bonds. I think of my college roommate, a favorite from 7th grade on, but because of distance, no longer available in a crisis.  Over the years we have each made closer friends.  Our history is deep but our contact infrequent.  Or a particular work colleague; more than acquaintances, we are comfortable together and pleased at opportunities for contact, but do not make specific plans to get together.  

So what is vexing about this?  The article says, and we know, that reciprocity is the foundation of friendship.  We trust one another.  The tension in a medium friendship arises from asymmetric expectation.  You may like your medium friend more than they like you, or vice versa.  One of us may want more time or sharing than the other. With our closest friends, as with our partners, we sort this out.  But without that closeness, with medium friends the different expectations continue. The relationship suffers from a lack of clarity.  

Miller writes that the "silences around a medium friendship are recognizable . . . to anyone who [hears] 'I'll call you' too many times."  One man wonders whether his feeling that a friend in crisis depends upon him too much is a result of his own sense of self-importance rather than any neediness in her. But being a "medium friendship," they never approach it.  Another person is hurt to be introduced as a "work friend."  "I thought we were closer than that," he thinks, but never says.  Another is confused because her friend cancels and doesn't follow up to reschedule.

"Such an imbalance confounds and wounds us," the author says," leaving us feeling powerless, angry or self-critical.  But we have no recourse."  Our friendships are bound by invisible lines we may not even be aware of ourselves.  

So what might be a different view of friendship?  The article discusses one not ranked (or giving rise to divergent expectations), but where each friendship is organic.  I have a group of knitting friends, a book group made of friends, couples' friends who are so close they appear in the direst of emergencies, couples we eat out with, others we brunch with after church.  You may have the perfect tennis partner or walking buddy.  I may have someone who understands the law the way I do, or literature, or music; who loves dogs or follows Duke basketball; or enjoys a serious conversation.  Who shares my faith or love of the beach.  Who will knit or craft with me.  Each friendship can flourish on its own terms.  We are both served.  What a lovely medium friendship.  And if it waxes and wanes, that's what friendships do.  They serve a purpose that might dissolve for one of the friends or for both.  Or they may rekindle because the friendship was deep enough or rewarding enough to outlast the waning.  

This article gave me much to think about today.  It was time well-spent.  Perhaps with these insights I can enrich my friendships as well.  

                                In friendship, Nina Naomi