Friendship Circles: Gender Differences in How We Do It?

[Bard]

I have friends all over the spectrum but only a few are really close I just don't let folks in. I am actually painfully shy but I was always the aquward kid growing up the outcast never quite fit in so.. I try to talk to people but I want to be the positive one because I remember lots of hurtful crap that I was told way back when ..idk... phone has never been my best medium my sister fusses at me all the time that I do not call more it really hurts her but even desd and I text way more then phone

[Okiebug61]

I am totally different than most. I have had many a bad experience with people, and I am very picky who I let into my life. I am not good at following the in crowd because I fear there is a cliff at the edge!
Red and I have friends we hang with but they are all heterosexual couples.

[bright_arrow]

Originally Posted by SleepyButch

Once you get to know me, I rarely shut up!

I just seem to connect better with femmes for some reason. I do not need to talk with them daily but don't mind doing so either.

So I snipped that I relate to For anyone on my FB, it goes without saying that I have moments when I just won't STFU If you've only seen me at Reunion then I am sure you are shaking your head in disbelief. True fact!

And Sleepy, I am so glad you said it first because I actually fretted over saying it, though it is reverse for me - I connect better with butch and trans folks. I think I can count on one hand the femmes I have in my phone, and it was due more in part to having numbers if needed at Reunion then it being anyone I actually text on a regular basis.

At Reunion, I confined in the wife that femme swap is a very awkward situation for me because I feel like the new kid at school - I do not have a group to take refuge at. Perhaps a lot of it is also the amount of people in one room that overwhelms me, but it is really sad for me. I can't go over and hug someone happily and chat and show off clothes to. Like Cajun said, I also have no femme bestie!

However, if femmelicious does come across this, you are not my friend lovely lady ~ at this point you are family, and I love you bunches, so exclude yourself from this rant xo

AND now that I finally read the OP - I love to text, talking on the phone depends who you are, lucky few Skype We as a couple only have two lesbian couples in the area, and outside of that is co-workers. I think we would benefit from more local people to hang out with, but I am not sure. We're pretty content with each other. I know myself personally I communicate often through FB statuses and comments, and there are a few folks from here I text roughly once a week or two if not more.

As for how people make friendships - I am not really sure. It has been a LONG time since I've made a friend in person.

[PinkieLee]

My best friend and some of my closest friends are butch/trans. But I also have femme friends that are like sisters to me. Is one relationship more important that the other?! No.

Luckily, I hit the Best Friend jackpot when G and I met. What 8 years later, and it just keeps getting better. That friendship is fucking sacred to me!

I think it boils down to just having people that you mesh with. It's kind of like an ahhhhh haaaaa moment when you have that first conversation. It feels like coming home.

[Just_G]

Originally Posted by Jackhammer

The contact history on my phone is filled with calls from my wife and a few from my Mama. Not a phone guy, I prefer texts.

We recently had dinner with some dear friends, and for a moment I felt pure brotherly love and joy. As we toured their new home my butch bud and I inspected everything from the pool pump, trash compactor , lawn mower, AC unit. We made a pact to get together and hang the TV and install a garbage disposal. Because in my world, that's quality time. The good fucking stuff.
We did square off on the trash compactor which wasn't working and fixed it.
As we scrambled to find trash and run a test, we were excited like it was Christmas.

Those of us butches who have long hair, dig a tag of make-up, or prefer a blouse over a tee shirt.... I adore you. Its authentic to put your back up against a wall and say "this is how I do butch".
In our quest for commonality did we pull out rulers and start measuring each other? Did we get lost trying to "out dude the dudes"?

Butch, soft Butch..... I just want to break the fucking ruler.

Femme friends, talking on the phone etc, Ive never had one (except for my wife)
I think for me the divide is how we communicate with each other,
I don't want to process everything from A-Z for hours
Even though I can cook, sew, and cut coupons with the best, I see those as survival skills and not passions that I want to process.
No matter how hard I try the stove still catches on fire, my buttons always fall off and those coupons have expired. LOL

As far as the men in my life from this community, I cant imagine BFP without them. Authentic Fucking warriors, each and everyone of you. XXOO

Ive enjoyed reading how we do it, because its to me NOT a debatable subject, its a sharing subject.

I LOVE bonding over projects like that! I have to agree it is about sharing....if we don't share, how do we learn about each other? There are so many things I want to know about people, but when we all get together in person, we are so busy having fun, we don't have time to just sit and talk one on one. I try to make it a point to do that, but it just gets crazy...lol

I am going to start shooting you some texts Jack...I miss you throughout the year and I'll be damned if we will go that long without communicating somehow! Texting it is!! In fact, I am going to be bugging you soon because I have a kitchen plumbing issue I need some advice on.

[imperfect_cupcake]

after reading jackhammer it just brings me back to common interests, like genme said. I don't have any mates who'd look at a pool pump or ac. they don't fish or four wheel drive.
its just not my friendship pool. I do have quite a few mates who ID as butch but they just aren't that kind. I did try dating one who was very.... truck, fishing, video games, steak, works in a hardware store, doesn't talk much... but other than sex there wasn't anything in common and I felt kinda lonely sometimes with h just not my world, really.
if I hung out with a whole bunch of butches like that and femmes who did old school feminine type stuff, I'd probably think there was a big difference between butches and femmes.
but although I'm pretty girly in many ways many of my pursuits are just general interests like science, museums, galleries, pubs, cafes, lounges, various events for political things and fund raising.
I'd prefer to talk on the phone but no one I know can afford to. its rare Skype sessions and some text. mostly email and the bulk of my communication is through Facebook.
or in person. my local mates don't seem to communicate via any other mode than text to arrange meet and then hang and talk.
everyone else, in the uk, Australia, south east Asia, Holland, Greece, France and the us, is Facebook.

I'm sincerely not an old school gal - well... american style one at least.
its great if one is, I just don't get exposed to it much because my own personal interests lay in other things. I've had old school type relationships but we shared the common interests as mentioned above. and we all shared a box mix up of friends.

that's why I think where one is might also co tribute a lot to the question asked.
I think gender lines seem stronger in certain types of backgrounds or environments or the way you express your gender attractions.

I can see why it might look that way if that's what your friend circle looked like. so at least I'm not baffled now.

so thanks.

but the world is a massive place and with many ways to do the things we all do. I don't think I'll have anything in common save one or two things just because some has the same ID as me. that includes communication. to me it strikes me as an individual thing. I communicate with individuals so... I don't see a trend. but it do think gemme is right. its because I bond through common interests and common values and goals. not ID.

[nycfem]

I've enjoyed reading others' answers on this thread. I think what surprises me the most is just how much so many people hate talking on the phone and love texting. I LOVE talking on the phone. I often talk to my mom on the phone several times a day, sometimes for a few hours and sometimes for two minutes. I don't like phone "dates" or when every conversation has to be a long one. I really just like to hear someone's voice whether we are talking about nothing or something important. In fact, if you are reading this and enjoy off the fly phone conversations, please PM me so that we can exchange numbers. What's funny is that I'm not good at returning calls and may call someone else several times without a call back from them, while at the same time not minding at all if they don't call me back. I like to be very casual about the phone. Sometimes I resist calling friends because I'm worried they will think it's weird that I only have ten minutes and have nothing to say. Truth is, I just enjoy the connection, even if brief. It doesn't feel like the calls I do for work because there are no guidelines or expectations. I have this with a few people, though not many. This paragraph is part sharing and part advertisement for phone buddies . If you happen to be someone who also connects over the phone, reach out to me. It's always fun to get to know new people from our community. Conversely, if you've been getting calls from me, and that's not your thang, as I'm realizing -gasp, not everyone's like me!- just let me know that too. And then keep in mind that at some point I will probably forget and need to be reminded again.

As far as texting, I am just not very good at it. I feel that I am slow and have difficulty communicating. I will engage in it a little bit and am sometimes cheered by the unexpected text, but in-depth texting is hard for me.

I like email alright but often feel I don't have much time to email. There is, however, nothing like a long email from a friend. The problem is that I'm inconsistent in responding. Still, I can type faster than text, so for real written communication (that isn't a few quick words), I prefer it over texting.

Private messaging is not my favorite form of communication because I'm lazy, and it requires that extra step that email doesn't for written communication. I'd much rather exchange emails and communicate that way. But on the other hand, it's prettier than email (at least my email!) and keeps things on the site, which has its own degree of comfort, so I'm cool with it for communicating with people I don't write with a great deal.

Well, of course this wasn't the question, but methods of communication did come up in the discussion, so forgive my rambling on the topic.

As to the question, I have a lot more phone and this-site communication with people than BB, and BB has a lot more Facebook communication with people. BB also sometimes talks on the phone but definitely not as much as I do. I am equally friends with butches, femmes, straight people, and trans people (or trans femmes / trans butches). I'm sure this description is not phrased right but I think you get the drift.

In person, I like to take walks with people. I think it's a nice way to talk. I also like to have people over to our apartment (if I trust them!) and chat and eat and just hang out. I have a group of BF friends that I get together with maybe twice a year. Life is like that. Much of life is taken up with work and responsibilities of one sort or another, and it's not always easy to fit in person social time in. I have friends from this site who I have not met or even talked on the phone with (you know who you are!) who I feel a deep bond with for years. I feel like if these people lived closer to me, it would be so nice to get together in person as friends. But, because of the nature of the geography of this site, it's just not possible.

There are also people who I may not be close friends with here but respect deeply on this site. They may not even realize how important they are to me, but I read their posts or see how they handle situations, and they end up holding a close place in my heart even if I don't tell them because it might sound weird. Hopefully that doesn't sound too stalkerish .

Anyway, enjoying this discussion and looking forward to more people posting.