The Girls from Ames

The "Girl from Ipanema" walked alone, and her samba to the sea lasted a scant two minutes. In contrast, The Girls from Ames have walked together for 40+ years, and their journey is far from over.

Several years ago, journalist Jeffrey Zaslow wrote a column on women's friendships. He received many letters and e-mail messages in response, including one from a middle-aged woman who recounted the life-long friendship of 11 women ("girls") from Ames, Iowa. He eventually wrote a book about them that I am happy to recommend, especially to male readers like me who might be curious about how the other half lives.

The book is largely descriptive, accounts of the women's lives separately and in particular together. The book contains enough interpretation and reference to survey data to satisfy this social scientist, but it never bogs down in the "research shows" motif.

The theme of the book is that women are different from men with respect to their friendships. Exceptions of course exist, but women interact face-to-face, whereas men interact side-by-side. Women's friendships revolve around one another, whereas men's friendships revolve around shared activities.

I used to play a lot of pickup basketball with the guys. They were my friends, but when the games ended, so did the friendships. I used to play a lot of cards with other guys. They too were my friends, but when the dealing was done, so were the friendships. And I am embarrassed to say that I used to spend a lot of time in a bar drinking with still other guys. They were my friends as well, but not after the final last call some years ago.

My closest friends now are women, and I do not expect these friendships to end. I doubt that I am as good a friend to them as they are to me, and I am glad they also have close friendships with women. Those are the friendships that research shows to be healthy, lasting, and satisfying. Those are the friendships described in The Girls from Ames.

The women in the book are ordinary people with an extraordinary friendship. They are now scattered across the country. They are pursuing a variety of careers. Some are married, and some are divorced. They have all had triumphs and tragedies in their lives. But they remain friends. "Research shows" that a friendship established before age 40 is apt to last forever, at least for women. Too bad marriages are not that stable.

A few weeks before reading this book, I talked to a 20-something female student of mine about to leave for the summer for an internship far from home. She was excited but fretted than she knew no one in the town to which she was moving.

"And I'm so shy," she added.

My response: "But no one there knows you are shy. Why not be outgoing?"

She liked that advice and said it was a good idea. But now I realize that it was just one perspective. After reading The Girls from Ames, another and perhaps better suggestion would have been for her to invite her friends - specifically her female friends - to visit her while she was away.

Friendships are not just in the here and now, and they cannot be created anew each time we relocate. According to one of the women from Ames: "You can tell people where you're from and who you were, which is who you are. But no one really knows you unless they were there."

Zaslow, J. (2009). The girls from Ames: A story of women and a forty-year friendship. New York: Gotham Books.