After last night’s Foo Fighters concert, new guy and I met up for a quick minute with a good friend of his (we had been holding their stuff as we were in the stands and they were on the standing only floor). It was like a page out of the soap-opera bar-star days all over again. Very odd. Very disconcerting. (More after the jump if your feed isn’t indicating that.)
This happened to be a good female friend of his. This isn’t strange territory to me, I’m a close female friend to a lot of guys, some with girlfriends or wives, some without. It’s totally do-able.
With that said, this is the scenario: We had parked near a patch of grass. Guy lays down on back in grass while we wait. I lean against car. Crowd of four friends approaches. Without actually acknowledging my presence, girl friend straddles my date on the ground and proceeds to start tickling him. After a few seconds (and while still squatting over my date) she sticks out her hand and says “I’m Xxx” and has let go and turned away before I can close my agape maw and open it again to reply “I’m Jen, nice to meet you.” The other 3 and I awkwardly introduce ourselves to eachother while she finishes up whatever she was doing to him down there on the ground.
Fucked. Up.
Now maybe she was drunk. And maybe this is the kind of friendship they have. Goodness knows I’ve got that kind of relationship with many of my guy friends. But I’d have the fucking manners and good sense to not go jumping on top of them when I see them out with a date I’ve never met. Maybe it’s just me, but I think someone’s friends are a reflection on them. And even if they hate the person they’re out with, it’s up to them to decide whether or not she should be turned off completely by strange and unprovoked displays of crazy behaviour.
The guy also seemed more than a little embarrassed by it, and said “Yah, I dunno what the fuck that was about, that was fucking weird” when I asked him about it. So I’m 98.5% convinced it’s not a huge issue.
And this is the part where I go Psych 101 on the issue, and pretend like I know what I’m talking about. This was a display of the most obvious kind, of a girl saying “This shit’s mine, and you better know it.” I see it all the time with girls/women who don’t want to lose their guy-friend as an “always-on” confidant, fag-hag style. Also demonstrated often by the “mom” type who want to “protect” their friend from any potential of heartbreak, but really just afraid of a change in the current situation, or the possibility of an empty nest friendship if he decides his current girlfriend is a higher priority than she is.
So while I think I get it, I really don’t like it. I have no illusions that I’ll ever hold as special a place in my good friends’ lives as their significant other. And while I do have some exponentially good friends, I ultimately believe that my partner should be my best friend. And that in no way undermines the friendships I already have. And I just don’t get the impression that this girl is ok with things working that way in her friendship with the guy I’m dating. A final remark to that girl: I’m sorry that I probably gave you a dirty look. I promise at that moment it was founded more in shock and awe than the residual distaste and confusion I’m experiencing now.
I guess I forgot that if you seriously date someone for any length of time, you also court their friends. And hot damn does that ever bring out a whole OTHER class of crazies to deal with.
That cat-lady thing is looking better all the time.
