Friend Opportunity

This American guy, who I’ll call “M,” which is not his first initial but does stand for “man,” which he was, and is also the initial given to Rachel Weisz’s character in Vladimir, which I’m currently watching on Netflix, was checking out books with his daughter at the library.

I heard his voice and approached. Why do I always approach when I hear American voices? I’ve learned over and over that “being American” is not a foundation to build a friendship on. The Americans I meet here are usually happy to be in Australia and don’t want to talk shit about it with me. Besides, I was once so inundated with the sound of Americans speaking and it was nothing special! I never walked down busy streets hearing their chatter and remarked, “What beautiful sounds! I am really and truly home.”

Anyway, I approached M and asked, “Are you American?”

He turned to see who was asking and said, “I’m from Texas, bro.”

“I’m from Michigan!” I said.

Turned out he had two daughters about the same ages as mine. He teaches at a school my daughters may attend one day. Right away I sensed his ease with talking to strangers. We left the library, exchanged numbers. I had a good feeling about M and our chances of becoming amazing friends for the rest of our lives.

He texted a day later. M is one of these people who put line breaks in their texts, like so:

Hey Brad

M here,

How did the books go with the kids?

I have always found this text format to be a bit…something. I appreciate it when someone helpfully breaks up a lengthy message into digestible blocks of related data, but M’s text contained only twelve words. Did twelve words require this much breathing room? Could M be a toxic narcissist?? Or was I already looking for reasons to judge M, to dismiss him before a friendship could begin?

We shared a brief back and forth about our weekends, jobs, kids. I told him I was struggling getting my kids to sleep. M wrote:

Tell me about this sleep situation? Any evening active routines; maybe you should organise some evening exercise [thinking face emoji] I’ve heard it works wonders.

I thought about that. Wasn’t it true that after getting my kids home I let them watch TV while I made dinner? And wasn’t it true that I felt guilty about this but justified it by saying, Well, what are they supposed to do while I’m making dinner? Perhaps I could get them to be more active [thinking face emoji].

But was it not also true that I hadn’t asked M for advice? That I’d only wanted to commiserate with a fellow dad and hadn’t been seeking a wizened dad elder to come down from Father Of The Year Mountain to benevelontly bestow parenting hacks?

I did take M’s advice on board. After dinner one night I took the kids into the courtyard, we saw neighbors, we got invited to jump on their trampoline. When it was bedtime, my kids slept great. I owe it all to M!

It was another two weeks before M and I got to hang out. We met at a park. M was good with my kids, especially Olive, who can be a tough nut to crack with new people. I overheard him telling her how great it was that she was able to read. Olive is not excited about reading. I liked that an adult, a teacher no less, was encouraging her.

We strolled around and I had the chance to talk to M a bit. He was unwaveringly positive. I bristle at relentless positivity and think a degree of pessimism is healthy and natural. I told M optimism doesn’t come naturally to me. He said it didn’t for him either, that it’s a choice he makes day after day.

I suggested that M must have had very positive and loving parents, that he got along well with his dad.

“I didn’t grow up with a dad,” he replied. “I met my dad for the first time last year.”

This interested me, and I asked more about M’s childhood. All I knew about Houston, I told him, was that Beyonce was from there. Turns out M went to high school with Beyonce and all of Destiny’s Child!

My kids seemed to like his kid and I wondered if this could be the start of something. I envisioned a string of nice weekends where the kids and I would always have something fun to do, because we’d have M. My kids could frolick with his kids while I asked M if Kelly Rowland was nice.

Destiny’s Child circa ‘96. M not pictured.

Still, there were things that made me be like, Hmmmmmm! When we accompanied M for a brief stop at the grocery store, for example, I was stunned to see him put two cartons of caged eggs in his basket. Caged ones! In 2026! A millennial! And when I brought up the strife in America, he replied that he’d totally “switched off.” He did not follow the news in the US at all anymore.

The following Sunday he texted:

A few highlights from the weekend.

How was your weekend Mr Austin?

The “highlights” were two photos of a stage lit blue and purple with a giant screen in the middle. Flanking the screen on either side were three vertical banners, each displaying a vertical word. EVERY. SECOND. COUNTS.

In both photos, words appeared on the screen, the contents of which informed me the speeches were of the inspirational variety. One was a Martin Luther King, Jr. quote about the power of thinking. The other had the word “Lessons” in big letters at the top. The lessons were as follows:

1. You will never rise above the opinion you have of yourself!

2. Choices not chances determine your destiny!

3. Your past does not have to equal your future!

I rolled my eyes at the images and was fighting an impulse to make fun of M for attending a creepy “you can do it!” conference. I wondered if we were at a point in our friendship where I could tease him about it. If we were going to be friends, I supposed he should know that I thought this kind of thing was stupid.

Mine was good! I replied. Typical tiring but ultimately rewarding kids time. How was your CULT MEETING?

He wrote back:

Got to get you on the positive side [cry-laughing emoji]

A Cult is a culture, I’m all for culture.

What? I’m not an etymologist, and while I’m sure the words “cult” and “culture” have shared roots, a cult is not culture! It’s not quite as absurd as saying “A rape is a rapture, I’m all for rapture,” but it’s not far off!

His message went on:

Lots of pretty successful people learning from each other and taking action.

He asked why my weekend was tiring. It is here that our correspondence tipped into the danger zone. My reply began with what I saw as an innocuous jab at his optimism:

You positive people always trying to heal the world.

Then I told him why I was tired.

You know, all Sunday chasin them around. And they get into my bed in the middle of the night and destroy my sleep. So as much as I LOVE time with them, it is exhausting af. Don’t act like you don’t know how it is!

The tone of a text message can be difficult to discern, for sure, even with texts from people you know and love. By saying, “Don’t act like you don’t know how it is!” I was implying that every parent deals with this to some degree. I was hoping M would reply with his own stories of parental tiredness and needy children. But it’s possible I had insulted him with my “heal the world” line, and so he read everything I said after that through a lens of not liking me now. This is all to say that I don’t totally blame M for…whatever this reply was:

Honestly Brad, we don’t know how that is, we chose not to allow our kids in our bed nor do we ever sleep with them. We spoke to couples who didn’t co-sleep learned from them and I can count on one hand every time they’ve layed in our bed for more than 10 minutes.

Time with kids is a privilege, but it’s hard. I believe you choose your hard though.

Why do you say I’m positive?

Not trying to heal over here, just help people who want to help themselves.

The amount of distance M put between us with that text is impressive. Even the very beginning, “We don’t know how that is,” without so much as a “haha” to soften the blow! As if that weren’t cold enough, he launches into a dry account of the method he employed, the work he put into being the sort of person who does not know how that is.

In a single paragraph, he shunned my attempt to connect and turned my tiredness into my own fault. And then (icily, scoldingly): Time with kids is a privilege, but it’s hard. I believe you choose your hard though.

Is this M realizing in real time that I am a hopeless case? He now seems convinced that the way I approach not only parenting but life itself is incompatible with his worldview. His belief system. His…[shudder]…growth mindset.

And now we reach the crux of the issue: M was offended by me calling him “positive.” Why do you say I’m positive? Not trying to heal over here, just help people who want to help themselves. The implication being that I do not want to help myself.

How to reply? I’d hurt him somehow and it didn’t feel good to me. I wanted to deescalate and decided to pay him a compliment. A classic “fawn” response! (Am I the only one who’s only just learned about the “fawn response?” I guess it used to just be called “people pleasing.” Fawning is a way grosser word for it, I hate it.)

Duuude that’s impressive, I replied (referring to his sleep training technique), kudos to you guys. I guess at some point their mom and I stopped fighting them on it but maybe it’s time to lay down the law again. It used to be so cute!

I wasn’t impressed by M’s sleep training method at all! There are times Lily’s gotten in bed with me at 2am and crawled into my “nook,” using my arm as her pillow, that made me feel like the luckiest person on the planet and I wouldn’t trade that for a fucking thing, buddy. (It just so happens that if Olive also gets into the bed, it sucks.)

I went on:

And I say you’re positive because…you just seem really positive haha. I know you’re not trying to heal the world, I was attempting to be humorous!

The “haha” was wholly unnecessary. The I was attempting to be humorous! was yet another attempt to be humorous, to placate, to demonstrate that I am nothing but a nonthreatening blob of benign HUMOR. Why was I talking to M as if he were a knife-wielding drunk who’d found his way into my apartment?

M did not write back. That was a week ago. I guess that’s that. Or maybe not. Maybe he’ll read this and we’ll actually become sworn enemies. That’d be wild. But most likely, I won’t see him until he becomes my daughter’s fucking high school teacher. This gives me a good number of years to work on my fawn response. God, I hate that they call it that!

“Vladimir,” starring Rachel Weisz and Leo Woodall, is currently streaming on Netflix