Dec 12 2022
Recurring conversation
I have a few recurring conversations in my life. Every week, I get together with my two best friends to record an episode of our podcast. It’s a way for us to stay in touch and work collectively on a project.
I have a biweekly (every other week) brunch with another friend who goes to school nearby. We were close in high school and getting food twice a month makes me feel like we are still a part of each other’s lives.
I also have a weekly video call with an internet friend I met on Farcaster. We talk for about an hour every time and I always leave the conversation with new ideas.
Without these commitments, friendships can easily disappear. One of my favorite essays is about the unique nature of friendships compared to family or romantic relationships:
There is no external structure that compels us to keep up friendships when they are inconvenient. The closest friendships, the ones that feel like family, can end in a slow and undramatic muttering, with no defining event or explanation, until the word “friend” means “someone I used to know.” We depict friendships as an escape from rigorous relationships, forgetting that love itself is a form of rigor. Maintaining any type of meaningful relationship requires a daily reckoning with ourselves and with our obligations to others.
I’d like to have more recurring conversations, especially with some of my internet friends that I otherwise wouldn’t get a chance to interact with. It doesn’t have to be every week, or even every month. But having a slot in the calendar is a commitment from both people to keep the other in their life.