Me and the Boys

Friendships with girls aren't as easy for me as friendships with guys. I'm pretty sure I've talked about this before- I don't normally feel that instantaneous click with girls. I mean ya'll know how close Kara and I are, but we didn't have the insta-click at all. I have about three distinct memories from the first year I knew Kara... and I never would have guessed she'd be my best friend someday from those memories. In fact, now that I think about it, I'm not sure that I've ever just fallen into an instantaneous friendship with a girl. Don't get me wrong, I have some *stellar* girlfriends who are closer to me than anyone else. But we had to work it to that state.

Heck, it took Rhonda and I about 16 years to become friends.

If you use the relationship points idea, the people who you "click" with start with like 15 extra base points and a double refill rate. Now several of my gal-pals and I have reached a quadruple refill  rate... but we still had to fight up those 15 points and gain experience to make our refill rate so fast.

So here's something I *just* put together.

I just put it together because I'm kinda clueless when it comes to my own reactions and why I act the way that I do.

I've talked a lot about how there are certain people who I just click with, but I realized only recently many of the people who I have that feeling with have some similarities. Namely:

1) They are male.

2) They grew up in a small town... or even more so, they grew up *outside* of a small town- maybe even on a farm.

Now please understand, I'm just referring to friendships here. Nathan does fall in this category but he falls into *every* category, and there are a lot of guys who I'm referring to that I have no romantic inclination towards- who are married or taken or I just don't have an interest in. Nathan is the exception, not the rule.

And also, please note that the "rapport" feeling I have with a said person may be one-sided. I'm thinking of the people who I feel like I sort of instinctively understand and they seem to get me. They might not feel the same about me, and they may not, in fact, understand me as well as I feel like they do.

And there are some guys who I don't click with who are from small towns, so there is obviously more to it than all this, but I think I've unearthed a pretty significant piece of the puzzle.

But still, I can think of no fewer than 10 guys just off the top of my head who I've clicked with instantaneously or near instantaneously.

I can't think of a single girl.

And every single one of those guys is "from" a small town. (I use the quotes around from, because many of them are actually from a house/farm out in the country *near* a small town.)

Weird, right?

I think it's something to do with shared culture...

...and I was really close with my boy cousins growing up??

...and...well I don't know what else. Familiarity? Comfort? Understanding? Cheesecake?

Probably not cheesecake.

You'd think this would translate into making it easier for me to find a boyfriend, wouldn't you.

Not so much, turns out.