on friendship mapping, and the intentionality of friendship
a somewhat coherent piece about the topic perhaps most frequently whirring in my mind this year - friendship!
When I was first becoming closer with Pedro earlier this year, we did an activity where we mapped out all our friends on the whiteboard in his room, so we could get to know each other’s social landscapes. He did his chronologically — with significant people listed, top to bottom, through different stages of life. Mine was more categorical — I had my handful of besties in a cloud in the middle and from each one a section emerged on where I know them from, in which I also listed other significant friends from that same context (they could be places, e.g. Beijing, phases, e.g. high school, or groupings like “poly/kink/queer SF”. I also had a bubble for significant former friends I’m no longer in touch with, and I underlined in red all the people on the diagram I’ve had sexual/romantic encounters with.
People who know me know that I think a lot about friendship. I literally made a zine about it (together with Shannon, who is definitely one of my bestest friends). In it we defined friendship as a series of intentional 1:1 interactions — in which the better quality the interactions, the fewer interactions are needed for that person to be a friend (see graph). Shannon and I share a very intentional, and perhaps calculated, approach to friendship.
My roommate Sam told me I was the first person she’s met who thinks of these relationships in the same way she does — where all our friends are in our heads at all times as well as how close they are, what we expect from each other, etc — which is always moving and changing as well. It’s hard to capture this dynamism in a diagram, but it makes sense in the mind palace I promise.
Over the last year I’ve had a number of conversations with different friends about their own friend diagrams/mappings. When I first met Shane he told me he made a spreadsheet of all his friends from memory and categorized them into 3 (besties), 2 (close friends), and 1 (less close, blossoming, or used to be close). Shane intentionally didn’t reference any media or external sources to make this but he did cross reference his list with his recent conversation to check that he was aligning his energy according to his heart. (Like was there someone in category 3 he hadn’t talked to in a while? Reach out. Are there a bunch of people not on the list at all he was spending all his time on? Perhaps out of “other” motivations ? Retreat.)
Sritej, on the other hand, made their map solely from referencing all their chats in the last 3 months. His friends were in clusters but not hierarchies. “If they were in a second/less close category they wouldn’t be here at all.” Katherine’s map looks similar, with names circling theirs on a page — some of them with cute hand-drawn emojis (I got a rainbow and a flexing arm meaning “power queer” which I’m very proud of) and lines between people to show how they are connected/from what context she knows them from.
The most recent time I made a diagram was when I mapped out my friends in Vancouver for Michael when he visited — another person who’s earned the honorific “best friend,” which I’d need to muse further on to come up with a good definition for. These were in categories based on where I know them from, with stars next to people I feel closer to in that category. In the same exercise I also reflected on who I see multiple times a week (e.g. housemates) vs once a week or every two weeks (ish). There are also people I don’t see that much but still feel close to when we do hang out, and that I know I could call on if I needed something. And, there are the budding friendships I’m actively working on to deepen and strengthen. It’s been great to see my connections here blossom year 2 of living here, as well as the increasing connections between them.
I sometimes wonder if my approach to friendship is too intentional. Am I inhibiting fluidity and connections that might arise if I just let things be more? But I do think I am (usually) following my instincts, and these exercises are more to record what already happened. I can’t pretend they don’t influence my next actions though (and I can’t decide whether this is a good or bad thing).
Either way, it’s been helpful and fulfilling to exchange friend diagrams with people, especially fellow obsessive friend-makers. Lily drew her NYC friendships in concentric circles, similar to the ring road structure in Beijing, where we met (the text reads: Forbidden City, 2nd ring road, 3rd ring road, respectively). She believes that she thrives with one (local) best friend or partner, which she is currently in search of in a new city. This person is currently represented by an empty bubble next to her own name in the “forbidden city.”
What does your friendship map look like? What defines friendship to you? How do you think about it? How important is it to you? What do you think of this approach (highly intentional) vs others (more “flow”y)? I’d love to know.
Your friend,
xo urka