Ode to Sleepovers

How to make and nurture friendships as a grown up

Not exactly a hot take, but do you know what’s hard? Having friends as a grown up. I think it’s true for all the grown-ups, but I know it’s true for mothers. Coffee dates and the one-off “girls night” just don’t cut it. You feel like you can’t ever get past the surface of the conversation and plunge into the bits about secrets and dreams and fears.

New friendships can feel like first dates over and over again. You talk about what shows you’re watching and your favorite authors, but you never get to the building a life together piece.

Old friendships start to feel stale and obligatory. You ask about their mom, their partner, their new job, but your shoulders never drop as your voice does so you can whisper about your sex life. You relive old memories but you aren’t making new ones.

But I swear to god, I think I know the trick- the way to make friendships in your thirties and forties feel as intoxicating and as meaningful as the ones of your teens and twenties. I think you just gotta do what you did then. You need to have sleepovers.

I’m telling you, sleep-overs are as good for grown-ups as they are for tweens. You get to have another drink and take off your stupid pants.

Sleepovers are a way of making time for the friend that lives the next state over. Your relationships are not bound by proximity. A two hour car ride makes happy hour prohibitive, but if you’re making a whole weekend of it- heck, that’s nothing.

They give you enough time for conversation to slip into boredom and come back out the other side full of humor and insight.

There is little I love more in this world than sitting around my big, crooked pine paint speckled table with an unmade face, a cup of coffee and a friend who slept in my basement the night before.

Yeah dinner is great, but there is an intimacy that comes with having breakfast with someone that feels entirely different. And if your friendship consists entirely of “bra on” energy, I just don’t think you’re gonna feel as close.

I’ve seen the memes-I know some of you are gonna make a joke about how you need a pitch black room, a noise machine and your linen sheets to even get a wink of shut eye. But I wonder if a night of less than perfect REM cycles might be worth it in service of stoking relationships. I think a soul friendship is gonna leave you feeling more restored than eight solid hours ever will.

Sometimes we have to remind ourselves that joy doesn’t come easy. Sometimes we have to sacrifice a little bit of comfort so we get the big payoff. Our friendships won’t stoke themselves. We’ve got to grab our toothbrushes, load up the air mattresses and make our way to the people we love.

Pssstt…The 4x4 is kind of an extended sleepover for photographers.