Letting a Friend Take the Reins

Last week, my best friend texted me about a show she’d watched and thought I’d like. Naturally, being the dutiful friend that I am, I found it and binge-watched the entire thing in one day.
As one does.
Almost immediately, we decided we needed to find and read the books the show was based on, which led to a week full of rants, outbursts, dramatic reactions, and randomly “yelled” texts that probably made perfect sense to absolutely no one else. I even ended up writing an entire compare-and-contrast review of the book versus the first season over on my Patreon, because apparently this is who I am now.
But somewhere between the show, the books, and the mildly unhinged commentary, I realized this little adventure had become about more than fictional hockey players and our ability to spiral over them. It became about friendship, trust, shared joy, and the strange little gift of letting someone else drag you into something wildly exciting without needing to be productive or profound first.
As I’ve fallen down this wonderful and weird rabbit hole online, I’ve had a realization. It takes a lot of trust to let someone else take the reins. Not just to recommend a show or a book, but to have you step into it without blinking.
Okay, if Teresa is reading this, she knows there was, in fact, a lot of blinking. But none of it came from doubting that she knew I’d like the storyline.
Hockey isn’t exactly my normal thing, but we’ve been friends long enough that she knows my tropes. She knows the themes I come back to, the kind of characters I get attached to, and the stylistic choices that usually pull me in. Because I trusted her understanding of me, I was willing to step into this world. In return, I got to add several fun, engaging stories to my reading list this year.
Oh, and I also got a few very entertaining memories of late-night and early-morning blurted texts. 😉
The process of reading these books with someone, complete with constant commentary, was something I hadn’t done in a very long time. It reminded me a little of high school lit circles, except with books I actually wanted to read, which feels like an important distinction.
A lot of the time now, I’m running from one tech task to the next, or from one classroom to another, and friendship tends to settle into the background of adult life. My work friends are there, of course, but they’re also busy doing their jobs, managing their own lives, and trying to keep up with whatever chaos has decided to introduce itself that day.
Adult friendship just looks different than it did when we were younger. Gone are the sleepovers, the long phone calls, and the kind of constant togetherness that made friendship feel like an everyday part of life. Now it often looks more like occasional texts between workloads, quick check-ins, shared memes, or messages sent when life really decides to kick someone while they’re already down.
But reading these books with Teresa reminded me of that old familiar feeling. The shared jokes. The predictions. The favorite characters. The “just wait until you get to this part” tension. The immediate need to tell someone exactly how you feel before the thought has even fully formed. It gave me back a small piece of that always-present hum of friendship, not in the same way it existed back then, but in a way that still felt comforting, familiar, and surprisingly joyful.
At the end of the day, I didn’t just watch a good show or read an addictive series with my best friend. I was reminded of why I love reading. Reading doesn’t require a formal invitation, a schedule, an emotional debrief, or a polished “public-facing” version of yourself. It’s just there. A thread of connection woven through normal days.
And maybe that’s what made this whole thing feel so good. It wasn’t productive. It wasn’t planned. It wasn’t something I had to organize, manage, or tun into anything impressive. It was simply a friend saying, “I think you’ll like this,” and me trusting her enough to follow.
Sometimes joy really is that simple.
A book. A show. A wildly enthusiastic friend.
And a few unhinged texts set an unreasonable hours.