Trying to Make Friends in the Land of Nod

As I hope you've garnered from my blog title, I'm American. I like to think I'm not actually that loud, but sometimes I can be and sometimes I think people see me that way regardless of what I might do. We Americans do not have the best reputation abroad. We're not as loud as Aussies, but no one is really. People seem ready to forgive Aussies though, outside of sports fanatics, and less willing to perhaps give Americans room to be ourselves. I'm totally generalizing. Yes, yes I am.

It's funny though, I am often told by Brits that other Brits don't like Americans. Told that I can probably expect to be judged and perhaps treated unfairly at times. Yet, as far as I can tell, this hasn't happened. That may be because I am, as a friend of my husband one said, "Anglo-friendly." I can toss out some slang and I often call things by their proper name like lift, garage, loo, or brolly (spelling? seriously, I have no idea how to spell these words. I wrote "swimming cozy" on twitter and made a lot of people laugh). I think it might also be because it is impossible to tell if I am having a hard time making friends here because it is just hard to do or because I am American. Let's be honest, it's probably both. It's almost always both.

Making friends after college/uni is hard. A statement that many a journalist has made bemoaning the lack of the places and opportunities to make new friends when one is working full time and/or has children. Bollocks to that I say (see, anglo-friendly). And surely you could say that one can make plenty of friends at work and also make friends with other parents, particularly other at-home-moms like myself, when one has kids. While I think a lot of people believe these are separate worlds of friends, I feel that is down to people's choices. Before moving the UK, I had a pretty balanced group of close friends. There were long time friends, workplace acquired friends, friends without kids, friends with kids, and at-home-mom friends. Several of these really good friends I made in my late twenties and early thirties. Take that you nay saying thirty-something journos who say it can't be done!!

And then I moved to the UK and I have two or three friends. Nice friends. But not uber close friends (yet?). I am having a hard time meeting people. I asked my husband before we moved about how long he thought I'd have to chat to someone new before I could ask them for coffee. What's the Brit waiting time to avoid being "pushy"? He said he didn't know. Another friend said that I shouldn't worry because people I would want to be friends with would not be put off by my seeming or actual pushiness. Sigh. British people can be put off by almost anything though. (I am no less anglo-friendly!)

I find myself doing something I've never, ever done be before when living abroad. Something I have in fact done the opposite of when living in other countries. I am looking for other Americans. *hangs head in shame* I mean, I stalked a woman in the grocery store and then into the parking lot and faked a grocery cart steering problem just to talk to her because I thought she sounded American. And she was! And she was nice. Joyously, she offered her number and said we should have coffee within a few minutes of talking. But then she never answered my texts. Ever. Of course, I gave up after two attempts because I can take a hint.* I tried not to feel rejected. I tried not to feel like I was dating again and "like, why hasn't he called!??!?!!?" *wrist to forehead*

All of this leads me to a path that I have traversed before with not so stellar results. Finding other at-home-mom friends. I am not good at this. In fact, I'm worse at this than I was at dating (old friends reading this are questioning how that's possible, but I swear it is true). Because I am not a very good SAHM. I don't like it. There's no revealing in the beauty of infant-hood in my house. I am not crafty. I am not that great at housewifery. My home is livable, it functions and we are all wearing relatively clean clothes; but I'm not good at it the way a lot of SAHM are good at it and love to be that provider. I'm not a great planner, producer, arranger, shopper, bargainer, baker, or candlestick maker. I'm good at watching TV, buying groceries and not using them, impulse purchases of silly t-shirts, losing sunglasses and getting frustrated with my kids.

Why must I go this route? At the moment, it is almost the only path open to me. I am working on fixing that, but it is proving hard to get into a routine while house hunting and trying to decide what I want to be when I grow up, which all fall in between laundry, cooking, cleaning, asset management, and avoiding nuclear destruction. My oldest starts what the British call reception (state sponsored preschool) in September. I have been told, nay promised, that I will meet all these other parents and we will be friends. Damn it, we will! Because our kids will be friends too. Instant friendship, just add school uniform and crushed jammy dodgers.

What scares me is that this "reason" for friendship is exactly why I am supposed to have all these other at-home-mom friends. Which I don't. Now, I do actually like being a parent and I am excited for my kid to go to school (not just to be rid of him, in fact, I'm sure I'll miss him), so perhaps this time, this forced companionship might work. Maaaayyyybbbbee. Fingers crossed.

*I recently looked at my phone's recent calls and it turns out I've been butt dialing this lady a lot lately. I never deleted her contact (until now) and I guess it just happened one day and my butt thought, "Hey, let's just keep calling her since she doesn't like us anyway!" I'm pretty sure she never put my number in her phone. But if she did, I imagine the label has been rewritten to say "that stupid American."