Gen X Friendships Can Be a Real Bitch
Hey WNVM-ers,
Hi! Fawnia, here. Like many of you, I’ve been stressing out over watching “The White Lotus” and ruminating on childhood friendships, from the Gen X perspective. In the spirit of Mike White’s spicy writing, I started out thinking “Oh, this is gonna be my Burn Book.” But, after some thoughtful conversations, I made a better decision to explore what makes long-term friendships work, why Gen X relationships are unique, and, as inspired by “TWL,” when addressing the touchy politics question requires nuance — or not. So a big thank you to everyone involved for the free therapy session!
And in news you need to know, capri pants (?) and Hugh Grant’s hair (!) are trending.
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I’ll Be There For You
The Gen X-specific friendship lessons learned from the infamous girls trip in ‘The White Lotus’
By Fawnia
In the Thailand-set season three of “The White Lotus,” the girls trip trifecta has proved the most chilling storyline by far. The Trio even tops incest handies, surprise peen, and Frank’s (Sam Rockwell) extremely disturbing monologue that left Rick’s (Walton Goggins) mouth agape and eyes agog (and launched a million memes).
Because watching the interactions amongst best friends since elementary school — TV star Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan), hard-charging lawyer Laurie (Carrie Coon), and Texas socialite Kate (Leslie Bibb) — feels all too real: the backhanded compliments, festering teenage grievances, petty rivalries, judgements on wine consumption…
Watching and discussing how this “Real Housewives”-meets-Midsommar vacation unfolds also has me reevaluating how I approach my own long-term friendships — which ones made it (and didn’t), how the connections ebbed and flowed over the decades, and why Gen X bonds can be so special, yet complicated. I’m not alone.
“As I've gotten into my middle age, I've been reflecting on my lifelong friendships, which at this point, we're talking 30-plus years,” says writer-creator Liz Feldman, a self-described “friendship nerd.” She explores and celebrates female friendships in her Netflix series “Dead to Me” and her new joyful, moving, and snort-laughs-filled podcast, “Here to Make Friends,”1 with writer/actor and friend, Jessi Klein.
‘I’m just happy we’re all in the same place. I mean, talking on the phone is not the same.’
I’m kinda shocked that Angeleno Jaclyn, Austinite Kate, and Laurie, in NYC where “they're all sucking each other off at 8 years old,” still talk on the phone. How quaint! Admittedly, my old friends and I tend to text or DM these days. But maybe establishing our friendships during the days of monopolizing the family landline, circa pre-call waiting, and handwriting paper letters helped form an especially deep bond.
“You really had to exercise the muscle of friendship in a different way. When we were growing up, it took real effort,” says Feldman, who stayed close with her Boston University roommate through post-graduation phone calls. “If we wanted to be in each other's lives, you really had to extend yourself.”
Angela Garbes — author of the bestseller “Essential Labor: Mothering as Social Change,” out in paperback on April 8, and The Guardian’s “Halfway there: a column for midlife”2 — also remembers how analog correspondence helped cement a strong bond with her four college roommates. They now have an active text group to support each other through their X-ier stage of life.
“We exchange mammogram selfies every year now. We always check in,” says Garbes. “There’s a richness [to] the depth of conversations [with long-term friends], because you can just go right there. It's almost like a shorthand language.”
‘We're still the same people we were in the 10th grade!’
But that childhood-rooted shorthand may also involve reverting to teenage dynamics that continue to repeat themselves thirty years later — as a slighted Laurie points out to Jaclyn. Granted, Jaclyn did push Laurie — in the midst of an ugly divorce and career crisis — toward scammy health mentor Valentin (Arnas Fedaravičius). But, in a moment of self-doubt, Jaclyn claims him for herself. Kate, who plays both sides in her own need for approval, ratted the former out to the latter.
“There are these things that are leftover stuff from youth. I think that no one's let go of their insecurities,” says Garbes. “Jaclyn has to maintain this facade. But really, she's like, ‘Am I alone? Am I still beautiful?’” Earlier at the “bargain hotel for retirees,” Jaclyn, regularly facing ageism and sexism in Hollywood (and life), is horrified to be lumped in with her worst nightmare, while her hot younger husband is MIA.
Kate worries that she’s not as accomplished as Jaclyn and Laurie, or even has an identity outside of her husband, unless she’s with her friends — as she overhears them gossiping about later. Laurie, of course, grapples with her own crisis of confidence in her personal and professional life. So, they project onto each other.
“It’s less like they have competition with each other,” says Garbes. “It’s that being around each other brings out all of their insecurities.”
She further highlights the ingrained macro factors that fuel The Trio’s — and perhaps our — perceived competition with our female friends.
“As women in American society, we're all fighting over scraps. None of us has the support that we actually need. If we were whole as people and our needs were being met, I just don't think we'd care as much what other people are doing,” says Garbes.
Feldman thinks “the stakes get higher the older you get.” That's so true — as Gen X-ers, we’re multitasking our day-to-day with what comes at this stage in life: health issues, aging parents, grief, childcare, demanding careers, you name it. So friends might not be as available to you as you’d like them to be either.
“There has to be a level of unconditional love and understanding, and a reminder not to take things personally,” says Feldman. “It's kind of a trope, but if you can really see and hold space for people where they're at and not project your own stuff onto them, that's where the real friend stuff really blossoms.” She even grew her friendship with the BU roommate, Kelly Hutchinson, into a fruitful professional relationship, after the actor/scribe joined the “Dead To Me” writers room in 2018.
‘I look at you two and it's like I’m looking in a mirror’
The Trio seem to be doing the opposite during that brutal truthbomb-filled dinner, in which each friend weaponized how well they know each other to avenge long-held grievances and assuage their own insecurities. Jaclyn and Kate then pile on a cornered Laurie, who already feels like the outsider.
I swear I had a visceral reaction because that scene brought me right back to the seventh grade, when I joined a friendship triangle that expanded into a six-pack post-college. My throat kinda closed up, and my pulse started racing — the sting felt so fresh, even as an adult. (See also: the doomed “best best friends” triad in the excellent “PEN15.”)
What is it about odd numbers resulting in these fluid alliances that always seem to zero-in on your most triggering of trigger spots?
“We need to define things, and we love a binary,” says Garbes, who’s part of a five-woman friend group. “It’s interesting to me, because [the pairings have] shifted over the years.” Kind of like how “TWL” perfectly portrays a rotation of each one of The Trio overhearing the other two talking shit (thus compelling Laurie to silent sob/scream into her Giambattista Valli bag.)
I admit, in my own insecure and/or petty moments throughout the decades, I’ve consciously been the excluder. Same with Garbes, admitting to leaving out an old friend, who then called her out on it.
“I'm so grateful to my friend for doing that, and it was horrifying and humiliating,” says Garbes. “That's when I realized that I don't want to be the person that creates that dynamic.”
‘You didn’t vote for [redacted] though, did you?’
Before the third episode, and the uncomfortable reveal of Kate’s politics (what’s unsaid says it all!), friend of WNVM (and mine) Emma Fraser messaged me with: “just a trigger warning.” Because I’ve had a similar experience with a childhood friend, who, full disclosure, is no longer one. Bibb told Variety, and the official “TWL” podcast that she doesn’t think that political views/votes should be a friendship dealbreaker. But, in the year of our lord 2025, is a friend’s political leanings a solid reason to dump them?
“I'll be honest, as a gay woman with a family, I just don't have space in my life for someone whose politics would interfere or render me and my family less safe,” says Feldman, adding that she’s lucky to have never been in that position.
Sadly, I was. In March of 2020, on the cusp of COVID lockdown and the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes, I had to confront my then-friend’s refusal to discuss “politics,” i.e. engage with me about my fears, anxieties, or any type of discussion regarding my identity as a Chinese American.
“Everything is political,” says Garbes. “It's just that some of us have not had the privilege to be able to ignore that. Some of us have never had that luxury, because it's a luxury. Ending a relationship based on that is totally understandable to me.”
But she recognizes that cutting the cord could be decided on “a case-by-case basis.” Similarly, Feldman is open to seeing the “gray” area with old friends.
“Maintaining a relationship because you care about someone — and trying to have some sort of dialogue, or agreeing to disagree — I think there's room for that, too,” adds Garbes.
They’re both right, and maintaining friendships involves so much nuance. At the end of the day, with my “Kate,” what tipped me over the edge was her choice to stay comfortable within, and not admit, her privilege, over just being a supportive friend to me. And her politics, I mean … So I guess this is my Burn Book, huh?
‘We have been friends since forever’
“Friends that you made a really long time ago, if you really looked closely at the friendship now, would you become friends with that person — as they are right now — if you met them yesterday?” posits Feldman.
When it comes to The Trio, I don’t think they’ve considered breaking up, as they all seem to still validate each other within their dysfunctional codependency of veiled compliments and angry truth bombs. We’ll find out this Sunday if they leave Thailand collectively fake smiling and disassociating from the turmoil, or having a healthy conversation about how they’ve evolved as people 25+ years later. (Guessing the former.)
“Not every relationship lasts forever, and it doesn't mean that that relationship wasn't transformative or important in your life,” says Garbes.
Of course, I asked myself Feldman’s question, and determined my answer. Looking back, I could have done the dumping in a more elegant manner than firing off a rage text and abruptly exiting the “besties” text group. (It was a high-stress time, OK?) I also may have dabbled in the shitty, cowardly act of quiet quitting friends. (Let it be known, I have been on the receiving end of both forms of breakups.)
Garbes reflects on being hurt by, and then ghosting an old friend years ago. She later made amends; recognizing she should have just shared her feelings, instead of cutting the friend off entirely.
“It was because I couldn't admit that I was hurt. That was very humbling for me,” says Garbes. “Did it really take me 10 years to figure that out? Yes, it did. Because [the erroneous message] that I learned in childhood is: to be vulnerable is to be unsafe.”
Garbes’ realization also feels earth-shatteringly revelatory for me. Admitting feelings sounds like such a simple concept, but presenting vulnerability is incredibly daunting. I guess this is when I should put those “I feel” statements from therapy to work, huh? Can I at least do it by text? (I know, I know.)
“I’ve certainly had my moments of disappointment and friction with my long-term friends,” says Feldman. “But like all things at this point in my life, I've just realized that pretty much any issue I've ever had can be solved — or certainly improved — by better communication.”
Would love to see Mike White write that scenario for The Trio.
We are two Gen X journalists who celebrate people of our generation doing cool things, as well as analyze all the '80s and '90s nostalgia in current pop culture, fashion, and beauty. Read more stories like this one here!
You Oughta Know
The model’s face tells you all you need to know about how I feel about the return of capris. In the ‘80s I had purple corduroy overall capris that were baggy in the leg and tight on the knee, not unlike something a Jane Austen gentleman would wear if he was a clown. We even called them “knickers”?! Actually, I don’t mind stylist Irene Kim’s idea to toss a big shirt over them to make the proportions palatable. -CW [Gap]
This article about Gen X creative careers going the way of the dot matrix printer is making the rounds everywhere I look. Really validates my decision to leave a good-paying job in healthcare to become a blogger 15 years ago! -CW (Sob. -FSH) [NYT]
Cue the “Piano Man” harmonica, because Billy Joel is getting the documentary treatment. “Billy Joel: And So It Goes” will air in two parts on HBO this summer. Tom Hanks is one of several producers on the project. -CW [Deadline]
Young men are replacing their broccoli cuts (read my explainer here) with the Hugh Grant flop, allegedly. I support this! -CW [WSJ]
Guests on “Here to Make Friends” include Feldman’s friend of 20 years, comedian, actor, director Tig Notaro, who had me absolutely cackling. Upcoming guests include pro-friendship triple-threat and “Somebody Somewhere” star Bridget Everett and “Las Culturistas” co-host (and Bowen Yang’s best friend) Matt Rogers.
Garbes’ interrogation — sorry — of how “brilliant female British TV detectives” helped her understand herself especially spoke to me.
I shared some real doozy friend stories with Fawnia when she was writing this (sorry, those will stay in the WNVM cone of silence!) but I will say that I broke up with my best college friend after the 2016 election. She and I ended up screaming at each other in the parking lot of a suburban mall restaurant. (Hoping that did not end up on YouTube because it was the holidays and a ton of people were around 😬)
The Trio is the best part of this season of White Lotus, and really works in terms of reflecting the dynamics that any person, especially a Gen Xer, can relate to.
I was going to say I'd love a series focused on exploring longtime friendship dynamics but then realized that we're kind of getting that with the new Netflix series The Four Seasons and the FX series Dying for Sex (which looks AMAZING).