Measuring Up

When do acquaintances become friends? Friends become good friends? Good friends become best friends? New friends become old friends? And so on.

I'm not exactly sure of that answer, but I am happy to write a post about our good pals Jon and Dana Shank, and seeing that gradual motion over the past 2 or so years. He was a classmate of C's at Stanford and she is his wife, who I became close with through our gang of SO's (significant others, in Stanford-speak). On paper, I don't know if we would have matched up well. They both went to Stanford for undergrad, he was BMOC (big-man-on-campus) with his baseball scholarship and fraternity membership, she was in a popular sorority, etc, and they already had a full docket of friends coming into business school. We were the gay couple from the east coast who didn't know anyone.

Thankfully, Jon and Christian met early on in first quarter and hit it off. We went skiing together in Tahoe for C's birthday their first year in school and they rode with us on the way to and from, where we really got to know each other (and disoverd a common love of Chipotle, which we waited 100+ miles to eat at). GSB events were always more fun when they were around. We were in the ski house in Tahoe last year, and went to Costa Rica for spring break. In short, lots of really really fun common events where we would always enjoy each other's company in the midst of a cool backdrop. (well, mostly cool-- I don't know if you could really call the GSB Auction "cool"....) We affectionately called each other our GSB "best-ies", or slang for best friends in the world of Mrs. Shank.

But it's really been since Jon and Christian graduated last year that I have seen our friendship evolve to the next step. They still live in Palo Alto as Dana finishes her last year in law school, so we're not as physically close as we used to be, but we've still managed to make time at least once a month or so to get together. It can be as casual as a dinner over at their place, or as it was this morning, a brunch in Burlingame, which is about half way between SF and Palo Alto. We sat down this morning and quickly began catching up on all of the latest stuff happening in our lives; C's new job, our hunt for a house, Jon's job, Dana's final stretch in school, etc etc. After brunch, we bummed around the shops in the neighborhood, hanging out, etc. In short, nothing particularly special.

But it is in that very "non-specialness" that I realized how, in fact, it is. When you are with other people in a fairly mundane setting of a brunch and feel like you can talk about anything and the understanding that they will listen, that's pretty powerful. And there we were, doing just that, not really talking about anything special per se, but as I think back over, it was really fantastic.

They are an extremely positive couple to be around. I'm sure they have their differences, but pretty much every interaction we've had been with them shows that the chemistry that they share between them is infectious; they are very much in love with each other and seem eager to share that with the other people in their lives. They have a very wonderful trait of not only being able to share richly about what is happening in their lives, but also of listening to and richly caring what is happening in ours.

I think about that a lot after we see them; there's no question that I'm able to talk about what's going on in my life. But am I also interested to hear about however I am talking to has to say? Do I really care about what they are talking about? Mostly yes, but sometimes, honestly, no. And am I fully investing in relationships that return this kind of warmth and value, and frankly, not investing in ones that don't? Again, mostly yes, but not always.

Making time to see each other? Learning good lessons from each other? Thoroughly enjoying time together and looking forward to the next? Feeling like I can trust them? I know there's no "official" measuring stick from friends to good friends and so on. But with amazing people like Jon & Dana in my life, it doesn't seem to matter much.