What's Next for 52 Friends?
I'm working on something important
Hey friend,
In 2010, the then-mayor of Kyiv, Leonid Chernovetskyi, answered a reporter’s question about his government. He began by nonchalantly saying, “My team and I are working on something. Important.”
His response was met with laughter.
As I write this, I’m not exactly sure what I’m doing next with 52 Friends but I know it’s going to be significant. When I started this project in October 2022, I was sad. Now, for the most part, I am happy. Happy enough that I would never have the motivation to make 52 friends—a common phenomenon.
Joan Rivers once said that after she married her husband and began making money as a comic, there was little to joke about.
I published my first posts at the kitchen table of my Miami apartment but I’ve come to consider 52 Friends more than just a project. It’s a small corner of the internet. A place where we can gather to discover and celebrate friendship.
That’s why I know the next chapter will have to involve something that we work on collectively. I’m thinking a monthly prompt that will challenge us to reconnect with a friend or plan a date with our best one. Then I’ll share how one of us tackled the task.
Personally, I must keep writing. In 1976 Joan Didion penned an essay for the New York Times Book Review titled “Why I Write”. She wrote, “I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.”
I share her sentiment. If I stop writing, how will I live?
I’ll need another monthly column. A philosophical one—conversations with a friend where we’ll dive into topics like memory or mannerisms.
That leaves two more weeks of the month.
The newsletter’s popularity has granted me access to the finest of academics and researchers and I should write from a scientific lens. This will give us concrete information to help measure our collective task.
Finally, I’ve decided that I’m going to profile someone in my neighbourhood. A weak tie. A person I see from time to time who will add richness to my view of friendship. That makes four sections—a prompt, a conversation, a theoretical overview and a story with someone new.
I’ll start sometime next month. I’ve just come back from a work trip to Montreal and I need time to organize myself. We’ll talk soon :)
With love,
Miriam
If you haven’t read my post about my final two friends. It can be found here.
Invite your friends to subscribe so that we grow our community and comment your thoughts below. How has 52 Friends impacted your relationships?
Thanks for your creating the project to start and for continuing it after it's natural end.