Sometimes the reason you can’t find people you resonate with is because you misread the ones you meet

“Through a Glass Lushly,” Michalina Janoszanka, ca. 1920

1.

Sometimes two people will stand next to each other for fifteen years, both feeling out of place and alone, like no one gets them, and then one day, they look up at each other and say, “Oh, there you are.”

In the early 2000s, Helle (who is the daughter of two of my friends) was at Copenhagen University. Helle and some classmates decided to meet up each Thursday for dinner. As the months went by, one person after the other found a partner, got busy, and stopped coming, until only Helle and one of the men were left. They, on the other hand, were surprisingly stubborn: the year they turned 41, they were still having dinner every Thursday.

That year Helle had no one to travel with, so she asked the man if he wanted to come along to Greece, and, spending a week together on Milos, they realized they loved each other.

“A little too late for any grandchildren, though,” said Helle’s mother, Alice, when she told me the story.

If you’ve never changed your mind about a person like that, it might sound like Helle and her husband were exceptionally out of touch with their feelings (or perhaps they settled once they ran out of options). I don’t think that was the case. I’ve met them a few times, at and after Helle’s mother’s funeral, sadly, and they seemed like sensible people and a clear match. I wouldn’t be surprised if it is rather common for people to misread each other like that, except, most people never get around to realizing their mistake.

Maybe I’m projecting.

2.

The story I really wanted to tell in this essay is about Torbjörn, who is one of my two closest friends, but who spent 15 years as one of the extras in my life before I realized he was one of the main characters. I suspect there are a few important lessons to be learned by meditating on how it was possible for me to misread an opportunity for genuine friendship for so long.

The embarrassing thing is that I don’t remember when I met Torbjörn. I know for a fact that we were at the same middle school, but when I’m picturing him there, I’m pretty sure I’m constructing false memories. Three years later, we entered high school, and since that