Perspectives on Friendship at 30.

Last night I went out to celebrate a friend's 30th birthday. She wasn't happy about turning the big 3-0 and I was a bit shocked by this. I was so excited to turn 30. Mostly because that meant that my 20's were behind me, I had proper street cred related to being over the learning filled, embarrassing moment filled 20's. The 20's were fun, but I was quite happy to say goodbye to that decade of life.

The ages of the people who ventured over to Shanghai at the same time as I did range but most people are in their mid to late twenties. This has made me think about whether I waited too long to do this whole thing. As we get older, we get much more 'stuck in our ways' and although I don't think that is a bad thing, I feel that I have less tolerance for neediness, stupidity and I'm much quicker to realize how toxic people can be. I walk quickly away from that sort of thing these days.

Not to say that I won't befriend people I shouldn't in the future, but everything is so magnified when you are going through this kind of a life change and people aren't able to hide much related to their personal insecurities. People get clingy, showcase that they have no self-esteem through a variety of behaviors, get stupid and embarrassingly drunk, etc.

As an observer of people and their behaviors, this has made it tough for me to connect with a lot of people here. Of course, one thing that I have learned in my thirty years is that friendships that take time, aren't hot and heavy are always more worth the while, and so I'm trying to remember that when I get frustrated that I don't have a bunch of friends here, yet.

The few friends that I have made here (easily counted on one hand) are wonderful people who I have already made great memories with. Even if I sometimes doubt that I came to Shanghai at the right age, I'm having quite a different experience because of it, one that lends to less drinking and more thought. I suppose that it's quite nice to have this time to reflect, all on my own.