Death of a Friend

So no one told you life was gonna be this way

I’ll be there for you…

Like so many, my friends and I awkwardly ‘adulted’ (new verb) alongside ‘Miss Chanandler Bong’ and the rest of the gang. Which episode is that a reference to, Friends fans??

It was our generation. As we turned 30, the characters of Friends turned 30. We were getting married, having children, serving coffee, finding jobs, falling in and out of love, making mistakes and feeling pain right there with them. We all had a mate who worked in something uniquely dull and unintelligible such as being a ‘transponster’, we all had regrettable one-night stands, still couldn’t emotionally separate from our parents or properly manage our money whilst simultaneously being handed responsibilities that outsized our ‘grown-up’ hands.

Friends was like our own extended friendship group, right in our living rooms, just when we needed it.

Author Matt Haig wrote on instagram on Sunday:

I was agoraphobic. Trapped inside panic disorder. I was recovering from my first and most massive suicidal breakdown. The most calm my neurotransmitters ever were at that time was watching the Friends reruns on Channel Four. There were edgier comedies but the last thing my mind needed was edgy. It needed familiarity and comfort and televisual cocoa. Social media without the socialising.

Wow. That’s exactly it - televisual cocoa. Served on an overstuffed, large orange sofa. Or perhaps a barcalounger.

Even now, Friends is my comfort blanket. I can watch it any time of day, week or year, just as it is. We weren’t conscious of the ‘fat-shaming’, lack of diversity and other questionable attributes of the show when it first aired, we were simply there, entwined in their lives, and they in ours. As it bled into my daughters’ consciousness, they rightly questioned those attributes, and yes we cringe at re-watching certain moments, but Friends appears to have remarkably transcended its failings. It has not been cancelled, it has thrived, and it is the comfort blanket for subsequent generations too, because at its heart it beats with a pulse of humanity and pathos, and it makes us feel less alone.

That is a rare gift.

My teenage daughters watch and re-watch it, and make their boyfriends watch it. We play the Friends board game and bring Friends trivia on long car journeys, and although my husband does not participate, (much preferring our geography quizzes on ‘Sporcle’) even he can’t help but chip in with the odd answer that has subliminally infiltrated his brain over the years of incessant playing in the background.

When we heard the news of Matthew Perry’s tragic and untimely death this weekend, we were all just so very, very sad.

It’s like you’re always stuck in second gear

As us viewers stayed in the Friends time warp due to the constant carousel of re-runs, the actors behind the phenomenon have variously flourished, and publicly disintegrated.

I have delighted at watching the magnetic Jennifer Aniston on the brilliant ‘The Morning Show’; celebrating her acting skills whilst only mildly distracted by what she has done to her lips (and as for Courteney Cox’s taking to the scalpel - well I could scream). Whilst they have become ever-streamlined facsimiles of their super sleek hair, such are the unimaginable pressures of Hollywood, the equally talented Lisa Kudrow has evolved in a more realistic and reassuring way. David Schwimmer and Matt Le Blanc have matured, de-eightified their hair, diversified into various film and TV ventures - some of which are superb, some not so...and then...Well then there’s Matthew Perry.

Photo by Rifky Nur Setyadi on Unsplash

Well it hasn’t been your day your week, your month, or even your year

Earlier this year, I read his autobiography ‘Friends, Lovers and The Big Terrible Thing’, which documented his by then, very public struggles with addiction to painkillers and alcohol and the devastation to his self-worth that accompanied it. I read it initially with a curious blend of sadness and writerly indignation, but overwhelmingly, sadness. The destruction of a young man with the world at his fingertips delicately framed by the self-indulgence of the truly privileged and a societal narrative that money makes you happy. The fact that it did not always sit entirely comfortably is what made it so heartbreaking.

It almost read like an extended interview / visit to the confessional box - laced as it was with the bravado of his sexual conquests, references to obscene sums of money, ostentatious properties and acknowledgement of his phenomenal talent. A not so silent scream for validation against a truly tragic backdrop of pain, fear of rejection, addiction and despair.

I don’t have the book anymore so I can’t quote from it, but at the end it felt like there was an air of hope for his future. Demons finally vanquished.

Time to live again.

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Someone to face the day with

Last October on a family trip to New York for my 50th, we visited The Friends Experience - an homage to the show, the characters and the actors. A chance to browse their apartments, re-live favourite storylines, and have a coffee in Central Perk, on THAT sofa. My husband opted out, instead visiting a Sports Bar and subsequently getting sucked into what he described as ‘a fabulous drag show’ (only in NYC?), leaving us girls to it.

Last night, as we reflected upon our level of shock (but not surprise) and sadness at Matthew Perry’s death, we discussed what was so special about that Friends experience. It was being in their apartment, being in Central Perk, feeling the embrace of friendship. Those characters felt like our friends. My daughters described it as like their second home, they knew it so well. Their comfort home. We chatted about our favourite moments from the show, and there are many, but some of the stand outs were:

Chandler’s proposal to Monica, and that hug between Joey and Chandler when Joey runs back in the door. Best relationship in the show? Joey and Chandler. Matthew Perry bringing us such joy and holding our hearts, whilst his own was empty.

It’s well documented that he can’t even remember filming three seasons of the show. In the book it details how Jennifer Aniston reached out to him, how the actors were actual real friends on and off set, yet even they could not save him. I know from my own heartbreaking life experience that some of the most incredible individuals cannot be saved.

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Someone I’ll always laugh with

Earlier this week, my eldest daughter had a ‘gathering’ for her 17th birthday - I went out for a moonlight swim leaving them home with some beers and a lot of trust. When I got back, I felt like I’d walked into an extended episode of Friends as they gathered on the sofas, joking, laughing, taking the piss out of each other.

One teenage boy stayed in the loo for quite a while causing me momentary mild concern (primarily of a selfish nature as to what I was going to have to clear up). Turns out he was wiping the dust off my plants as he emerged from the bathroom with a gentle reprimand - ‘you know they can’t breathe properly or photosynthesise unless you clean the leaves’. It was like a perfectly scripted moment.

As I tucked myself away in a different room, listening to them singing at the top of their voices to ‘Dancing Queen’, I felt the beautiful intergenerational cycle. I mean ABBA was already retro by the time I was ‘young and sweet, only seventeen’. There aren’t that many popular culture influences that have had an equal impact on their generation as they have on mine. ABBA is one, and Friends is another.

I then made tea at midnight whilst (not so) subtly wiping down surfaces to indicate party closing time, and three of her friends them joined me for a cuppa whilst discussing our vinyl collection.

My younger daughter has an equally beautiful mixed group of friends. They mess around and throw socks out the window, dabble at the fringes of adulthood and then make gingerbread men at Christmas. They have it all to come. Our house is the gathering place, making her feel like it’s Monica & Rachel’s apartment, or perhaps their Central Perk.

We even have a big orange sofa.

…cause you’re there for me too

Friendships are what make the world go round. My own friendships mean more to me than anything, and have got me through the most devastating of times. People who have lifted me, held me, grounded me, consoled me, laughed with me, loved me. Those who are my story. None of which has been able to circumvent tragedy, because that’s not how life works, but how lucky we are to experience it.

Matthew Perry made a career out of demonstrating how to be the best friend to others, with all the beautifully portrayed self-doubt, under-confidence and quiet wisdom of one who is always there for you. The self-aware joker, the vulnerable one, the one you trust, the one you love. (Political essays on the general state of the world and the U.S. opioid crisis aside), there is one gaping space on the sofa this week.

Thank you Matthew Perry for making me feel like Chandler would have been my friend, and for making millions of us feel less alone. You will be greatly missed.

As I continue to reflect, I will hug my friends ever tighter this week.

And to all of my friends, always know that my sofa is your sofa, and I’ll be there for you...cause you’re there for me too.

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How does this make you feel?

What reflections do you have on your own friendships?

I’d love to hear.

Love and lemons 🍋

Em xx