Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Friends. Neighbors. Bro-Mance.

My husband has a boyfriend, and I am thrilled!

OK, so you are wondering what the heck am I talking about, or what kind of marriage arrangement do we really have? Let me back up and explain.

I have known my husband for about 5 years now. It is fair to say he doesn't have many close male friends. His best friend is a female (named Bambi, no less! And no, she's not a blonde stripper, and no they never dated or got physically intimate. She was married, went through a divorce, and remarried, she's a country girl and Michael has assured me many times he's never been attracted to her. I am totally cool with it now, but as all insecure girlfriends do, I had a period of time when I wasn't so cool, no matter what Michael said or did. With time I realized he was being truthful and got over it). Anyway, besides Bambi (which, again, I would kill my mom if she named me that!!!), when we worked together there were several women who were his friends, and apparently he had several female friends in college (but only two real girlfriends). He has a core group of guys he hung out with in elementary and high school, but it seems as he's gotten older he talks to them and sees them less. Currently, as far as guys, he mainly only hangs out with his brothers and a few of his first cousins. But even that is a little sporadic. Since relocating from Bloomington-Normal to Tinley Park I think we both have been disappointed with how inconsistently we hang out with his siblings and cousins.

Side note: All of my closest friends have always been girls. Though I do agree in some ways that it might be easier to get along with males because there is less cattiness and back stabbing and all of that drama. But I could never get over the initial question of "are we just friends? does he like me that way?" The whole "When Harry Met Sally" dilemma.

I digress. Back to my original point.

Enter Scott. Scott lives two houses over from us. We met him last summer after we moved in. Most of this past winter we didn't see any of our neighbors much. It was like we were all hibernating. But, as spring sprung, people were out more, and he and my husband were neighborly talking from yard to yard, which evolved to going over to each other's places to help fix things, then going/coming over to watch sporting events. His wife works late shifts at two hospitals so often he was alone in the evening and I would guess lonely. Sometimes I have tagged along, other times I wouldn't go and joke they were having a "man date", to which they thought was hilarious. We had recently seen the movie "I Love You, Man", about a man finding a good guy friend, having some "bro-mance", so the description seemed fitting.

I am just happy my husband is making a new friend. And not just a friendly acquaintance, a true buddy with whom he has a close bond. They have several things in common and it just feels good to see my husband happy and having an alternative to hanging out with boring old me all the time. Actually, one night me and Michael hung out with Scott and his wife and we all had a really good time, very relaxed and casual. They are really genuinely nice people who I could see us becoming very good friends with in the years to come.

Now, if only all of my closest girlfriends didn't live out of state!

3 comments:

  1. I wish I had a guy who lived down the street from me to have a bro-mance with.....

    ;)

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  2. too funny Janet. wasn't there a neighbor who did kind of like you? but maybe you weren't so into him...

    ReplyDelete