a warped view

Let me start this post by saying that I love my mother shaped person to absolute bits and pieces. She has always been the things I aspire to be as a mother and woman, strong, independent, loyal, loving, courageous, caring, compassionate and an optimist. However there are some things that we just don't see eye to eye on. One of the biggest differences between us is our view on sharing personal stories, emotions, hurdles, etc. I think it is 99% a generational thing. She was raised with the belief that you didn't talk about personal problems, you just got on with things. Mental illness was considered a weakness and weakness in any form was not something that other people should know about. Serious issues were always discussed behind closed doors and were never, ever talked about in polite company. It is ingrained in her and on top of that she is a very private, reserved person any way. I, on the other hand, am seriously lacking a filter (as if you hadn't noticed already).

Sometimes I meet people and I know instantly that they are awesome! They laugh at the same things I laugh at, they share similar views to me on things, they are clever, sassy and generally pretty neato (I'm mostly talking about other ladies here), and I think to myself, you're pretty fantastic and I would love to have you as my friend and do stuff with you and hang out and talk about life and love and stupid things we've done. Then comes the kicker. How, as a thirty something grown woman, do you ask another grown woman over for a play date or out for dinner, without seeming like a weirdo / lesbian / desperate / friendless / loser? It's much easier for kids to make new friends, they just say stuff like "I like He-Man and you like He-Man and I think that makes you totally the best and we should be best friends forever until we're like, old and wrinkly and  our butts sag" then they piss themselves laughing and the friendship is cemented. But that just doesn