I'm in an intergenerational friendship with a mother and daughter. Here's what we've all learned from our connection.
Courtesy of the author
- I was an undergrad in a rural Michigan village when the pandemic hit.
- While studying for final exams, a stranger knocked on my door with a "final survival bag."
- She was a professor's wife, and we soon became close friends. I'm also friends with her daughter.
Your early 20s can often be a lonely time. Once launched out of the world of the family you grew up in, it takes time to find your own footing.
During this time for me, I was a young newlywed and still in college. Then the pandemic hit over spring break, and nobody came back to school. Our rural Michigan village became a ghost town overnight, and my new husband and I spent our honeymoon going on long walks and cuddling under the blankets, frightened one of us would die from this new mystery virus before we'd been married even a year. The Friday before final exams, I heard a knock at the door and nearly spilled my coffee all over my course notes.
A stranger knocked on my door and we soon became friends
I opened it to a smiling stranger. She handed me a plate of muffins topped with turbinado sugar. Our church had a tradition of making final exam "survival" bags for students, filled with snacks and energy drinks, that they could pick up on Sunday after the service. With the pandemic, I assumed that would stop, like everything else. But this woman had heard my husband and I were still in town, gotten our names and addresses from the church registry, and brought us muffins. After weeks of isolation, it felt like a warm hug.
We swapped numbers, and a few weeks after exams, in late May, I texted her to see if she'd like to go on a walk (about the only viable activity in those early pandemic days). Brooke had a generous grin, a young spirit, and a spunky attitude that attracted me instantly. She was in her early 40s, raising four kids, and was the wife of a professor in town. But 20 years prior, her life circumstances had been nearly identical to mine — she, too, had gotten married in college and spent the period after trying to figure out where to go next.
As our friendship grew during walks and talks, I began bringing her the life questions I'd been Googling with no success — What birth control should I use? How should a couple decide where to go post-graduation when our plans conflict? Spoiler: she was a much better counselor than Google. She had the wisdom of experience.
Her daughter and I we formed our own friendship
She also came to me with her own questions. One day, she was telling me about the difficulties she was having with her angsty, pre-teen daughter, Esther. I still remembered my own angsty self with total clarity, and an idea struck. Brooke had been such a help to me as an older and wiser friend. What if I could be an older and wiser friend for her daughter?
I don't know what her mom told her to convince her to come, but the first time her mom dropped her off at my house, Esther was smiling bashfully. It took no more than 10 minutes for her to lose her reserve and start talking my ear off. Esther and I started to meet up once a week, each Thursday after school.
Most days, I would give her a short lesson in classical voice technique, a hobby we both share. Other times, we sat at the kitchen table and painted. We browsed the used bookstore downtown for old editions of Plato's dialogues; we walked to the local diner for her birthday dinner; we explored campus together. She introduced me to "The Mandelorian." I introduced her to Korean gilgeori toast. And nearly exactly one year after I had met her mom, Esther and I recorded the vocals of her favorite song over the original track.
They say it takes a village to raise a child, but children are not the only ones who need care. In the early days of the pandemic with lockdowns and social distancing, many people's struggles intensified. It was daunting to rebuild a sense of community in the face of so many strictures and during a period of such rapid change. Since the pandemic started, I've moved twice in the space of three years and faced similar challenges in each place I've lived.
From my relationship with Brooke and Esther, I learned to be open to unexpected friendships. Although we naturally gravitate toward those similar to ourselves, we have more to learn from those who are different. In his book "Life Together," Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes, "the person who loves those around them will create community."
When I moved away from Michigan, instead of restricting my friend search to those who shared an appreciation of vintage style, were also part of Gen Z, and shared a love of classic literature, I widened my heart to include all possibilities. If I hadn't been open to the unexpected, I would never have begun to hike with a moose-hunting millennial during my time in Montana, or to meet weekly with a Spanish-speaking mom when I moved to New York.
So, next time you're looking for a friend, try showing up on someone's doorstep — or their cubicle — with a plate of muffins. You never know where it might lead.