Shirley Anderson, 28, has friends who haven’t started kindergarten yet and friends who are already retired.
“Having friends of all ages and in all stages is not only a nice thing to have, I think it’s deeply important to the fabric of our lives for a richer life,” she said.
The generational gaps between baby boomers, Gen X, millennials and Gen Z sometimes feel too vast to overcome, but people like Anderson who have prioritized finding friends of all different ages say it’s worth the effort.
She and two other women from three different generations spoke with the Deseret News about how finding friends of all ages has enriched their lives.
Multigenerational friendships give perspective
“I think I learn more from kids than from any other age,” Anderson told the Deseret News.
Recently at a birthday party her two little girls went to, Anderson observed how quickly children forgive and love each other. “They just run up and say, ‘Hi! Do you want to be my friend?’ without even needing to know their names,” she explained.
Sonya Thornock, 51, said her older friends helped her “savor the moment” but also gave her hope when she felt discouraged when raising her own children. Her friends’ kids were graduating high school when Thornock’s children were 3, 6 and 8.
Growing up in a neighborhood without other children, Melanie Biddulph, 39, felt she naturally “was friends with the elderly.” This propensity to making multigenerational friends became more intentional as she entered motherhood.
She said her friendships with older people acted as a guide map for her. “I was intentional in making friends with people who were 10 and 20 years ahead so she could see what worked and what didn’t,” Biddulph explained.
How to make friends of all ages
Anderson said that it’s important to be proactive when you’re looking to find friends of any kind.
“Reaching out first and not waiting for people to come to you is really valuable,” she said, adding, “Everybody needs a friend. You can never have too many friends.”
Anderson made her first older friend at age 5, when her grandparents moved to Utah from California.
Her grandma was the first person outside of her immediate family whom she felt really wanted to listen to her. They would play Crazy Eights together, and when Anderson got a little older, her grandma would take her to visit older people in the neighborhood, “which was really cute because she was older than all of them.”
“She had really young teenage friends that she would have over just to chat and have hot fudge sundaes, but we would also go and visit the elderly together,” Anderson said.
Through her grandma’s example, Anderson learned to see the value in every person no matter their age.
For her seventh birthday party, for example, Anderson invited her then-college-aged brother’s friends, and they all came.
“We hiked the Y, and they brought a change of clothes because they needed to go to work right after,” she recalled.
The key is just ‘to go first’
“Everyone is just sitting around waiting for people to approach them,” Biddulph explained.
She encourages people looking for new friends to recognize that “we all have our insecurities and egos, and we all navigate them in different ways.”
In the morning, she typically plays pickleball with the 70- and 80-year-old women in her neighborhood. Other times, she plays volleyball with a group in their early 20s.
From a conversation with an older friend whose husband had passed away, Biddulph found the importance of learning how to “show up” for other people. This friend told her, “You rarely remember the one’s who don’t show up, but you always remember the ones who do.”
This perspective inspired Biddulph to figure out the best ways to love people from each generation. When reaching out to younger friends, she texts them, “Don’t respond to this, but I’m thinking of you, and I love you.”
She explained how younger generations seem different from her older friends in how they want to receive love. While her older friends would welcome a random visit to their home, her younger friends sometimes feel like this is too much.
Sharing interests is a great way to initiate friendships
Thornock described several activities that have helped her develop multigenerational friendships. When she first moved to Longmont, Colorado, as a 25-year-old, she bonded with a woman named Vaunalee Fordham over crafts they wanted to teach each other.
If Thornock made a mistake while working on a quilt, she’d call Fordham, and she’d come over right away to help her fix it. After expressing interest in scrapbooking, Thornock helped Fordham do a life history scrapbook. Even though Fordham moved to an assisted living center in Utah, Thornock said they still text and call every so often.
Book clubs have also proved to be a great place to connect with others over shared interests. When Thornock realized two of the girls in her group also have birthdays in February, she proposed the idea of doing a birthday brunch. The two girls are in their 30s, and the tradition has continued. She now calls them some of her best friends.
She added that having multigenerational friends “just makes my life a lot fuller, and it’s more enriching.”