Being an adult, it’s hard to keep in touch with your friends. We’re all so busy and burnt out. And personally, I just really like spending time with myself in my free time. I tend to isolate myself because that’s just what’s comfortable to me.

But recently, I’ve been trying to make an intentional effort to reach out to my friends that I haven’t talked to or seen in a while. This last month, I must have been feeling super motivated because I made plans with three different friends.

First Round of Plans

One of the friends I reached out to I’ve been friends with since preschool. We were best friends in preschool and we were friends all the way through high school. Distance happened when we went to college, which is normal, but we did still stay in touch. I met up with her at a coffee shop in downtown Norwich and we caught up, which was nice. Honestly it’s so nice getting to connect with someone who’s known you for your whole life and grew up in the same town as you!

After that little meet up, I got my beloved alone time. I wandered around downtown Norwich on my own with my camera. It was honestly so awesome. I’ve always loved the historic buildings. But in addition to that, Norwich is where my late grandfather grew up and I spent a lot of time there with him. It is a town that really makes me feel connected to him. I used to go down to the harbor with him and when he was teaching me to drive, he had me driving through downtown Norwich. Norwich will always hold a special place in my heart because of him.

Second Round of Plans

I also recently grabbed dinner with another friend, who I haven’t known quite as long, but she’s such a close friend. She is literally the nicest and most thoughtful human being ever. She recently went to Niagara Falls and she was sending me all kinds of tacos she was eating on her trip. So I suggested we get tacos at my favorite Mexican place and it turned out she’s been wanting to try it for a while!

We caught up and she was telling me the funniest stories from work. I was laughing so hard. Then, to make the night even better, a double rainbow appeared! As soon as we noticed, we booked it to the beach to experience it there. IT WAS MAGICAL. As I was frolicking down the beach enjoying the rainbow, my friend was taking candids of me, which I loved. She’s literally so thoughtful. She also took the cutest video of me with the rainbow to help me get content for my travel blog. Seriously, she’s the best!

She then came over after and met my boyfriend, which to me was super special. My friends know all about him, but not many of them have met him yet because I try to hangout with my friends one on one to get quality time with them. But since we grabbed food close to my house, I figured it was a good time to have them meet! Literally such a wholesome night.

The Creation of Future Plans

The third friend I reached out to is one who recently moved to Tennessee. This friend lived in Washington state for years and I never got a chance to visit her because of financial reasons. I wanted to so badly, but I just could never swing it. Now that she lives an hour outside of Tennessee, I can afford to fly to her with the cheap flights from Tweed Airport!

I made plans to visit her in Tennessee in the beginning of June and I’m so excited! I saw her a couple months ago when she was in Connecticut, but it was only a day because she understandably wanted to spend time with her family and other Connecticut friends. It’s hard when you’ve lived away for 5 years!

This will be my first solo travel trip on an airplane and I’m so glad it will be out of Tweed because it’s such a small and easy airport. I probably can manage a regular airport because I’m a seasoned flier at this point, but I still would rather fly out of the teeny tiny airport. It’ll all be worth it though to adventure with my friend in her new home!

Keeping in Touch

While I do love to spend time alone and do my own thing, I also love my friends and the relationships I have with each and every one of them. I’m so thankful to have them in my life, and it’s so important to me that I set aside time to either reach out via text to check in and catch up or plan to get together in person if we can swing it!

I have friends who also just kind of isolate unintentionally because they’re just busy and overwhelmed. Honestly, I don’t mind being the one to reach out. I can tell you, those friends really appreciate it when I reach out! I never hold it against them because I know just how burnt out and busy I can get. We’re adults with our own separate lives, and I’m not going to get mad at them for having their own life…just as I would hope they don’t get upset if I’m not in constant contact.

I always try to reach out to my friends when something reminds me of them, even if it’s just a quick little meme. Like the other day I sent my friend a really corny meme because it made me think of her and her chickens. I used the meme as a segue to check in and see what’s up! This particular friend has three young children, one being a newborn, so I know just how busy she is.

Final Thoughts

It takes some work to nourish friendships, but it is doable and so worth it! It doesn’t always have to be in-person plans. Sometimes just a quick text to let them know you’re thinking of them goes a long way! And, if your friends don’t reach out, it’s probably not because they don’t like you anymore. They’re probably just really busy or burnt out from work and adulting. I have a lot of friends like this and I’ll just send them a quick text to check in and we can go into conversation like no time has passed!

If you’re not sure how to nourish your friendships as an adult, you can also check out this guide!

-Kailey

Making new friends as an adult is hard. I’m just about 27 at this point and I’m not the kind of person who goes to seek out friendships due to social anxiety, which I’ve been working on. But, I’m happy to report that I have in fact been making friends!

In a previous post, I had talked about finding community on social media through my travel blog accounts. Well not only have I used it to build an online community, but I’ve actually made a real life friend. I had mentioned in my post that I made some online friends, but one of them has recently become a real life friend.

This particular friend is into wildlife photography and she was mentioning that she was planning to go birding at a state park that’s pretty much up the road from my house. I told her to let me know if she goes and when she’ll get there so I could meet her there. The plans were made and it was both really exciting to meet someone I talk to regularly and really nerve-wracking.

I was excited to meet someone who’s local to Connecticut that’s also super nice. But, I was also nervous because meeting someone in real life can be stressful. I feel like you can be a lot smoother when talking to someone on the internet because it’s written. I had thoughts of what if I’m not how she expects me to be? What if she thinks I don’t look like I do in my pictures and Reels? What if she thinks I have a weird voice? (I have a bit of a lisp). I did actually get physical symptoms of anxiety too.

Despite all of the anxiety, I pushed through the discomfort and met her and her husband at the state park and we had such a fun time photographing Ospreys and a Belted Kingfisher. It was great getting to talk about wildlife, photography, and make a new friend.

As of today, we’ve now hung out twice to go birding. Today, it was not nerve-wracking to make the plans, it was just like me making plans with any of my other friends. The first place we went to was a bust with no birds, but we still walked and talked. The second spot we had a blast watching so many ospreys flying around.

I’ve never really thought of myself as someone who’s good at making friends because of my anxiety. It’s not that I’m not social. I love to talk to people, but prior to knowing someone I tend to overthink things. Once I get past that and get comfortable, I do great. I’m glad I’ve been working on putting myself out there a bit more and making connections with people who have similar interests to me.

If you’re looking to make friends, local or not, I’d definitely recommend joining some groups on social media or following some people who seem to have similar interests to you. Of course, you can also join in-person groups as well. They’re just not my thing.

What are some ways that you’ve found to make friends as an adult?

-Kailey

In honor of Black Poetry Day, this post is me sharing my poem Enough that I wrote a year or two ago and read aloud on my music YouTube channel.

This poem was made after the loss of a friendship that I really treasured. Sometimes relationships, platonic or romantic, fizzle out and it can be heartbreaking, especially if it was a relationship you thought would last forever.

– Therell