This is only about platonic, non-romantic friendships between two or more people of the opposite or same sex.
Do you think “generation gap” friendships are strange or not?
I think they are fine seeing as that one of my best friends is old enough to be my grandparent.
I would not call it age gap but a generation gap. People born in 70’s and 80’s are going to have different political views and out look at life than some one born in late 80’s.
That friendship and lovers/ partners could have less in common. I have known people born in late 80’s that have very little in common with some one born in 70’s and early 80’s.
When you start getting people born in the late 80’s to early 90’s things really change political views, social issue, morality and out look at life.
People born in the 40’s , 50’s and 60’s are so different that it is almost like person came from other country the culture is so different.
I’ve become friends with a guy I met at the gym.
He’s 32, I’m 55.
We train together 5-7 days/week, and our workout styles mesh perfectly.
We get dinner when our schedules allow. I think of him like a brother - even though I am much older, we have a lot in common, and we both work in similar fields. There are some things that our age differences highlight - movies that I think are classics that he’s never seen (e.g. - Animal House), and our taste in music is very different. But, for the most part, I think our age difference is not an issue.
We both love moving the weight, and that’s all that matters.
I have always had good friends much older and younger than myself. Itsr been a very persistent pattern in my life.
Me too. People in my age group appear to be hyper fixated on sex, drinking and being irresponsible.
NO , I was friends with a neighbor who was 20 plus years older than me. I liked her the most of all my neighbor . I missed her when she had to move . Age mean nothing to me when it come to friends .
Hey, could we cut senior citizens some slack? After a long life in the work force, people should be allowed to enjoy their retirement.
I learned from my parents. They had friends of all ages, as do I.
This winter I became friends with a 23 year old student at my place of work. He’s back at school now but we’re still in touch.
I’m 53 and one of my best friends is 62. Not much of a difference now, but it was when I was 23 and he was 32.
I actually just made arrangements to go for wings and a beer next week with a new employee, he’s probably in his mid-20s.
Age means little to me as far as friendships is concerned. I have restrictions on dating, on the other hand. If I’ll ever date again…
No. Most of my friends are sort of my age (plus minus 10 years), but I have a few who are a lot older. I used to spend a lot of time with my neighbor, a tough old lady who was older than dirt and had a lot of fascinating stories to tell but unfortunately she died a few years ago. Oddly, or perhaps not oddly, I have very few friends that are significantly younger than me.
I’m 52. My youngest friend is around 25. My oldest friend is around 67. Our common bond is music. We’re all Deadheads and jam band freaks. It’s common in the scene. No one gives a shit how old you are.
I have traveled a lot, alll my life, in backpacker style, staying often in hostels. I still do, at age 77. I meet a lot of people young enough to be my grandchildren, who I think of as being “ageless”, in that they feel perfectly comfortable in a social setting with people of any age. Not all people in their 20s can do that, but quite a few can, and I never feel uncomfortable socializing with them. I meet other hostelers in their 60s and 70s, and socialization in hostels is vibrant with people of all ages participating.
When I worked in a restaurant as a teen I had a lot of older friends and their friendship was valuable to me. I was like 16-20 and they were in their late 30s and 40s. I never really drank or smoked or smoked weed with anyone my age but I felt very comfortable doing it with my older friends. It was definitely a more relaxed thing with them as opposed to the anxiousness of teens.
I stopped working there and lost touch with most of the crew from work and then started catching back up with friends my own age. Then they all sort of passed me up with life - they got married and had kids and I didn’t.
Now in my mid-to-late 30s I’m friends with some people in their early 20s and it’s cool. They’re not encumbered by the family thing yet. In fact we’re all “doggy friends” and can talk about dog ownership stuff.
I have one good friend who is older. She’s the mother of my ex boyfriend. I totally keep forgetting she is as old as my parents, in her 60s. She is super f’n cool.
It’s way fun to be friends with people of all ages!
One of the best friends I ever had in my life was 35 years older than me. We had more in common than most friends I have had who are the same age – we just fundamentally viewed things in the same way.
My newest friend, whom I just met a few months ago, is about 25 years younger than I am. We are starting to discover all of the things we have in common, but also how different we are. I think the fact that she was born and raised in a very different country creates more of a cultural gap than the age difference, but it’s refreshing to spend time with someone who has such a different perspective.
I’ve always gotten along better with people who are considerably older than me. At the same time, I’ve always had a difficult time making friends my age. It doesn’t matter what group I’m in, I always kind of feel like an oddball. But the “oddball” feeling is more intense when I’m with people my own age. Older people tend to be more forgiving and understanding.
But the downside to having older friends is that sometimes the relationship can revert to a parent-child thing. You get more unsolicited advice from an older friend, and often it is outdated advice. Also, if you’re the younger person, you may be treated as the ambassador for Contemporary Pop Culture and Technology, whether you’re an expert or not. However, I do have an older friend right now who has exposed me to things I wouldn’t have experienced on my own–like “The Americans” and “Mercy Street”. But if she can’t get her iPad to work, she always expects me to be able to fix it. Even though I have never owned one.
I joined a writer’s group last year full of mostly retired older men. The youngest is 15 years older than me, the oldest is 70 (I’m a 33 year old woman.) These are basically my new best friends. It feels more normal than not. I’ve always been, as one of them put it, ‘‘an old soul’’ and while I have plenty of women friends I tend to gravitate toward groups of men by default. The combined age/gender difference makes for some interesting insights, mostly because many of them can’t write women characters worth shit, and because their attempts at capturing younger generations are generally two decades out of date. They consider me an asset in that regard because I can tell them where they’re getting it twisted. Likewise they can play the mentor role as I learn to navigate the publishing world. I need their decades of experience and they need a fresh perspective. It works really well.
Me too. I have a friend from synagogue who is almost young enough to be my daughter, and another friend who was one of my best friends when I lived in another city, who I still exchange email and texts with all the time who is almost old enough to be my mother. My friends fill in the who range, and it’s pretty much a straight scale, not even a bell curve around my own age. I’m even a little older than most of the other parents in my son’s class, so when I make friends with other parents, I’m nearly always about 8 years older.
I’m also just getting to be friends with someone I work with, who is 70, and most of the people who go to the daily minyan at my synagogue are older than I am-- most are a good 20 years older, but some are only 6 or 7 years older.
^ This.
All grown ups are the same age.
I grew up with a large family age range - aunts and uncles close to my age and cousins almost of a different generation. As a teen, I was also treated as an adult in my parents social circle.
As a result I have always been comfortable with age diversity. At the moment my best friends are 20 years younger and 10 years older.
In theory, there is no problem with being friends with adults of any age, but in practice it’s different. I have tried to be friends with adults of all ages, but the friendships that stick are with people within ten years of my age younger and older.
I wish it were not so, but I find that I have less in common with people whose age is much younger or older.
I have found that I prefer the company of people who are much older than much younger.
I have friendly acquaintances of all ages. The younger ones I know seem so lost and naïve that I find it tedious.
I tried being friends with someone my father’s age, but he dropped me. Perhaps he thought I was lost and naïve. Although, it was probably more likely that he wanted to date me, and when he found out that I only was interested in friendship, he left.