I'm always perplexed that adult men have like zero friends. Maybe its a generational thing?
Friends are super important!
As an adult man with 1 friends
Distance , man. Although I am friends with and do hang with a coworker outside of work.
Some days Blue wonders why anyone ever bothered making numbers so small; other days she supposes even infinity needs to start somewhere.
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Blameless Cleric An angel made of sapphires each more flawlessly cut than the last Registered Userregular
My interior life can be very chaotic and it's very verbal; it's hard to imagine a life where I would not be constantly introspecting! Even learning to meditate, with the goal of a quieter mind, is just another kind of introspection, just more structured
Wait, are you not supposed to like talk to yourself in your head and break down the happenings of the day and what they meant, is that not a thing everyone does?
I used to do this a lot: "when I’m at work I am always analyzing how other people might be feeling or thinking in general or about me"
I have since realized that "no one cares or is thinking about you" is a much better way to approach the world.
How often would you say you think about what your coworkers are doing or what your thoughts about them are? Not directly related to you I mean.
I realized the answer is probably, pretty much never so the opposite is probably true. I might be interested in something they are doing, or worried about a fuck up that has happened, but I'm not devoting time to them in any meaningful way for the most part.
Second, the guy internalized feedback and is adjusting his behavior accordingly, you might argue with him about the internal reasoning, or be mad that he didn't empathize correctly in the past but he's making an effort to grow. There is literally nothing more that we should be asking of people than that, beyond that is all icing on the cake.
Or maybe I'm just a person with similar sociopathy as your father.
To be clear, I do not think about it with neurotic anxiety. I’m just curious about how other people’s lives are and how they feel and what they do at home and all that. People are interesting to me. (To be clear, if they’re miserable, I find that interesting rather than upsetting—so it’s not like I’m not a sociopath in that way)
Also, my dad asked me ‘ok well how should I act towards you’ and while that’s in theory a nice question, in practice this literally means me scripting every interaction and telling him what to do on every occasion. I don’t want to write his side of the dialogue as well as mine! that takes effort and isn’t very satisfying. That’s why I suggested that he think about what it might feel like to be me and what he might want from his parents if he were in a similar position. Then he can act based on that instead of just responding to negative stimulus (I yell or cut off contact) or based on a script I gave him (“I need you to tell me you unconditionally support me and still love me”)
Man I do not like sending or receiving birthday cards
I'm glad people don't send them anymore
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
a fun thing i do sometimes when i am alone and musing is i think a thing and then i will say the thing out loud and then i will make fun of myself for repeating out loud the thing i just thought
Allegedly a voice of reason.
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
I'm always perplexed that adult men have like zero friends. Maybe its a generational thing?
Friends are super important!
Men aren't trained to do emotional labor like women are
Most guys, for instance, don't send their friends birthday cards
I don't know any girls that do this either tbf
I do text my friends on their birthdays and/or call to wish them happy birthday
my two good bros from high school I would call fairly regularly just to chat, but that's stopped with one for whatever reason. the other one we still talk about once a week tho.
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
a fun thing i do sometimes when i am alone and musing is i think a thing and then i will say the thing out loud and then i will make fun of myself for repeating out loud the thing i just thought
I hope you do this when you think you're alone and it turns out your aren't alone
a fun thing i do sometimes when i am alone and musing is i think a thing and then i will say the thing out loud and then i will make fun of myself for repeating out loud the thing i just thought
There have been times where I think I'm losing it a bit and so I say words out loud to make sure I haven't had a stroke.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
As my friends have their social lives obliterated by children, thus destabilizing mine as well, I can't help but think that our weird, isolated traditions of child-rearing also contribute
Of course if it were different, I'd have to like, deal with their kids more often, which sounds terrible tbh
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
Man I do not like sending or receiving birthday cards
I'm glad people don't send them anymore
Querry reminds me to because she got all of the useful but also shitty conditioning.
I feel bad at the emotional labor disparity between us, but also... I dunno. I am stretched pretty thin and have higher emotional needs anyhow so I don't think it could be otherwise.
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Sir Landsharkresting shark faceRegistered Userregular
im actually a level 6 empath so I don't have to think about how people might be feeling I just know
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The trick to dealing with oil changes is apparently to just live in the UK where I don't know anybody who has ever changed their oil.
Maybe our car engines are just full of ancient sludge. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe it's part of the mysterious annual service that a good 25% of people bother with.
It's this one, usually.
It's often an upsell from wherever you get your mot but many people genuinely do not bother and it doesn't seem to hurt anything. For most people they will never see the six figure mileages where historic lack of oil changes start to cause problems.
Having said that I bought my last car with 135,000 miles on it and a proper oil system flush and oil change made a huge difference, but that oil was possibly 10+ years old.
Oh man they invited a poker player into the booth and she was talking about a charity in africa and being super super racist like "oh all these girls would be amazing runners if they knew what running was." It was super painful.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
I'm always perplexed that adult men have like zero friends. Maybe its a generational thing?
Friends are super important!
I think a lot of it comes from the old gender binary where the man is out working and the woman stays at home with the kids. So the man ends up with colleagues he can tolerate and might hang out with a better but statistically they will not end up working at the same place for that long and will probably not live near to one another. While the woman is able to meet people socially who live locally and can progress some to friends.
I think we've escaped a fair bit of this but in general there is a filtering of number of friends as you go through life in my experience. Being at uni was like cheers where I could just wander into certain places and expect to find somebody in my friendship group to hang out with. During my PhD this reduced quite a lot (I had about 40 people at my leaving from Bristol. Later a friend, who had entered the world of work, confided to me that she just couldn't imagine ever gathering that number of people unless she got married). And then entering the world of work I changed cities so had to start from scratch and mostly make friends at work, which is not super effective and we mostly have kids so we socialise less often. I can still rustle up a couple of people for a pub trip but it's not effortless.
Homogeneous distribution of your varieties of amuse-gueule
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TL DRNot at all confident in his reflexive opinions of thingsRegistered Userregular
As my friends have their social lives obliterated by children, thus destabilizing mine as well, I can't help but think that our weird, isolated traditions of child-rearing also contribute
Of course if it were different, I'd have to like, deal with their kids more often, which sounds terrible tbh
Do it
Be weird uncle EM, who just kind of sits in the corner and can't figure out what to do when a kid runs over to him.
My interior life can be very chaotic and it's very verbal; it's hard to imagine a life where I would not be constantly introspecting! Even learning to meditate, with the goal of a quieter mind, is just another kind of introspection, just more structured
It's weird, because I have an internal monologue (however, internal visualization is much stronger for me)*, but it's not active all the time and meditation has extremely low value for me, if anything. I've used it as a substitute for napping when I was a resident, which was helpful, but I've always found that as a waste of time. Similarly, prayer (which can be compared to meditation in some ways) was a waste of time for me when I was an Active Christian, and probably part of the long list of reasons why I turned away from the church.
* Both of these things were probably cultivated at an early age from a love of pen and paper RPGs, I feel.
The trick to dealing with oil changes is apparently to just live in the UK where I don't know anybody who has ever changed their oil.
Maybe our car engines are just full of ancient sludge. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe it's part of the mysterious annual service that a good 25% of people bother with.
It's this one, usually.
It's often an upsell from wherever you get your mot but many people genuinely do not bother and it doesn't seem to hurt anything. For most people they will never see the six figure mileages where historic lack of oil changes start to cause problems.
Having said that I bought my last car with 135,000 miles on it and a proper oil system flush and oil change made a huge difference, but that oil was possibly 10+ years old.
Wait, what?
We change oil here every ~3000-5000 miles. Do y'all top it off, or..?
The trick to dealing with oil changes is apparently to just live in the UK where I don't know anybody who has ever changed their oil.
Maybe our car engines are just full of ancient sludge. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe it's part of the mysterious annual service that a good 25% of people bother with.
It's this one, usually.
It's often an upsell from wherever you get your mot but many people genuinely do not bother and it doesn't seem to hurt anything. For most people they will never see the six figure mileages where historic lack of oil changes start to cause problems.
Having said that I bought my last car with 135,000 miles on it and a proper oil system flush and oil change made a huge difference, but that oil was possibly 10+ years old.
I now know one Brit who has changed his oil
Homogeneous distribution of your varieties of amuse-gueule
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
Excuse me but I have no friends for reasons entirely unrelated to gender norms
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Hi I'm Vee!Formerly VH; She/Her; Is an E X P E R I E N C ERegistered Userregular
I think literally the only person who has consistently wished me Happy Birthday on Facebook every year for the last...I dunno, several years at least, maybe like 7 or 8 even?...is @Haphazard.
I mean I get Happy Birthdays on Facebook from a variety of people usually, but Haps has been extremely consistent.
As my friends have their social lives obliterated by children, thus destabilizing mine as well, I can't help but think that our weird, isolated traditions of child-rearing also contribute
Of course if it were different, I'd have to like, deal with their kids more often, which sounds terrible tbh
Do it
Be weird uncle EM, who just kind of sits in the corner and can't figure out what to do when a kid runs over to him.
When my cousin was visiting with the new baby, his wife asked me if I wanted to hold him, and I said "no," and everyone yelled at me
Then I held him, dutifully, and he started crying immediately
Posts
As an adult man with 1 friends
Distance , man. Although I am friends with and do hang with a coworker outside of work.
I'd love it if you took a look at my art and my PATREON!
I have zero friends.
Yeah those fuck... shiiiii
To be fair I have no real friends either.
pleasepaypreacher.net
To be clear, I do not think about it with neurotic anxiety. I’m just curious about how other people’s lives are and how they feel and what they do at home and all that. People are interesting to me. (To be clear, if they’re miserable, I find that interesting rather than upsetting—so it’s not like I’m not a sociopath in that way)
Also, my dad asked me ‘ok well how should I act towards you’ and while that’s in theory a nice question, in practice this literally means me scripting every interaction and telling him what to do on every occasion. I don’t want to write his side of the dialogue as well as mine! that takes effort and isn’t very satisfying. That’s why I suggested that he think about what it might feel like to be me and what he might want from his parents if he were in a similar position. Then he can act based on that instead of just responding to negative stimulus (I yell or cut off contact) or based on a script I gave him (“I need you to tell me you unconditionally support me and still love me”)
I'll be your friend chanus
It's a common problem for men and their mental health in our culture IIRC
We are not taught or encouraged to reach out and form bonds or ask for help
ok see you every six months maybe
I'm glad people don't send them anymore
cards make me uncomfortable
like
what am i supposed to do with this
how long do i have to keep it if no one will ever see it
thanks for the scratchers though
but seriously can i throw this away now it's been three months
I don't know any girls that do this either tbf
I do text my friends on their birthdays and/or call to wish them happy birthday
my two good bros from high school I would call fairly regularly just to chat, but that's stopped with one for whatever reason. the other one we still talk about once a week tho.
i'm certain it has happened
There have been times where I think I'm losing it a bit and so I say words out loud to make sure I haven't had a stroke.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Its especially damning for him because we have the same birthday.
Of course if it were different, I'd have to like, deal with their kids more often, which sounds terrible tbh
Querry reminds me to because she got all of the useful but also shitty conditioning.
I feel bad at the emotional labor disparity between us, but also... I dunno. I am stretched pretty thin and have higher emotional needs anyhow so I don't think it could be otherwise.
It's this one, usually.
It's often an upsell from wherever you get your mot but many people genuinely do not bother and it doesn't seem to hurt anything. For most people they will never see the six figure mileages where historic lack of oil changes start to cause problems.
Having said that I bought my last car with 135,000 miles on it and a proper oil system flush and oil change made a huge difference, but that oil was possibly 10+ years old.
pleasepaypreacher.net
I think a lot of it comes from the old gender binary where the man is out working and the woman stays at home with the kids. So the man ends up with colleagues he can tolerate and might hang out with a better but statistically they will not end up working at the same place for that long and will probably not live near to one another. While the woman is able to meet people socially who live locally and can progress some to friends.
I think we've escaped a fair bit of this but in general there is a filtering of number of friends as you go through life in my experience. Being at uni was like cheers where I could just wander into certain places and expect to find somebody in my friendship group to hang out with. During my PhD this reduced quite a lot (I had about 40 people at my leaving from Bristol. Later a friend, who had entered the world of work, confided to me that she just couldn't imagine ever gathering that number of people unless she got married). And then entering the world of work I changed cities so had to start from scratch and mostly make friends at work, which is not super effective and we mostly have kids so we socialise less often. I can still rustle up a couple of people for a pub trip but it's not effortless.
That was a for-instance
Men don't jump in to help clean up after dinner, we don't inquire about our friends' emotional health or share our own, etc
It's not malicious, we're just raised without those expectations
Do it
Be weird uncle EM, who just kind of sits in the corner and can't figure out what to do when a kid runs over to him.
* Both of these things were probably cultivated at an early age from a love of pen and paper RPGs, I feel.
Like it's kind of a high bar to see something and know "Oh thats so Adam".
pleasepaypreacher.net
Wait, what?
We change oil here every ~3000-5000 miles. Do y'all top it off, or..?
I've purposefully told people a text is fine on my birthday. Send a gift card or buy me dinner if you want to get me something.
Cards I open and go "oh that's cool" and they go in the trash immediately.
I now know one Brit who has changed his oil
Also try to smile and hold both hands above your head to check for motor deficits. Do the whole thing >.>
A-are we supposed to
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
I mean I get Happy Birthdays on Facebook from a variety of people usually, but Haps has been extremely consistent.
Well I will now!
pleasepaypreacher.net
I'd love it if you took a look at my art and my PATREON!
When my cousin was visiting with the new baby, his wife asked me if I wanted to hold him, and I said "no," and everyone yelled at me
Then I held him, dutifully, and he started crying immediately
The child is weak and I do not respect him