The perks of having a girl space friend

Some say it’s next to impossible — to have a girl best friend or “GBF” when you’re a dude. They say that some time during your closeness, the two of you will end up getting together and becoming more than just friends. It’s the story of boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, girl opens herself up to boy, with all these stages anchored by a common-level anatomy of being of the “opposite sex.”

It’s the “men are from Mars” and “women are from Venus” thing where, despite inhabiting the same infinitesimal universe, your differences will propel you to seek each other out and pique each other’s magnetism and curiosity constantly like positron to negatron, yin to yang, or the Geminis who, when they lock weapons, are at their strongest in The Man with the Iron Fists.

It’s either that, or you decide to keep your relationship in the (best) friend zone, though a sliding door of flirtation and sexual tension hawks you like a shadow. In efforts to maintain this friendship, you constantly turn the other cheek and remind yourselves that you’re just friends instead of giving these would-be disastrous shouldawouldacouldas the time of day it oh-so-craves. “Sayang the friendship eh!” So. True. In which case, set your sights on other potential partners. There are other fish in the sea.

In all my years of being a social being who, in no conceivable way, would have been able to live on bread alone, let alone testosterone (no offense bros!), I’ve had the privilege of counting girls to be some of my bestest friends in the world with whom I can share absolutely everything with.

Maybe it helps that I’m not “interested” in them in the first place (well, not anymore) and that we can share anything and everything these days besides an STD. For some reason, girls get me, and I get them, sometimes even more than the Sex Bomb Dancers get pain, or I get my ridiculous and crazy self. “Get, get, ow!”

At 26, I pride myself on having GBFs in all fields and phases of my life who, to this day, are some of my biggest sources of social, emotional, and existential sanity and stability —childhood GBFs, theater GBFs, publishing GBFs (more fondly known as ateh gurls), and barkada GBFs whose defining traits have been the undeniable level of comfort that we’ve fostered over time. After all, friendship is a garden that you have to water constantly for it to stay verdant. Need you still ask whose names are on my speed dial for dinners, nocturnal prowls, Mongolian lunches, emotional crisis, and the like?

It’s not to say however that my seeming “lack of interest” has exempted me from the laws of the universe. No. There are still certain physical acts shared between a guy and his GBF that can still feel awkward at times, only because, well, you are of opposite sexes and there’s nothing in the world that can change that. No, not even a sex or a gender change. Case in point: working your way through a crowded bar.

In attempts to not lose each other, you and your GBF end up locking grips and holding on to each other for dear life. In the action of pushing and shoving, the fact that you’re “holding hands” is something you’d hardly notice but once you’ve gotten to your destination, there’s a moment of awkwardness and sexual tension that happens before ultimately letting go.

Ahhh… the sliding door. “What if you were actually my girlfriend instead of my GBF?” Now, wouldn’t that have been easier? All that level of comfort saving you from the act of having to “get to know” your eventual partner. Well, not really. Like with any new relationship of the romantic kind (the devolution of GBF to romantic girlfriend is technically a new relationship), partnerships take a great deal of effort to sustain. If it doesn’t end well, like most dalliances, things get messy (yes, even if your girlfriend was, once upon a time, your GBF, in which case you’ve ruined a perfectly good thing).

So you move on from that moment of awkwardness when you held hands at a bar, or when some people mistake you for a handsome couple, or when your parents try their damned hardest to sow those seeds of doubt in your head so you’ll end up together. Thanks, Mom and Dad, but getting us to hook up is like getting Ross to date Monica. Wrong. On. So. Many. Levels.

This comparison thus explains the relationship that eventuates between a guy and his GBF — a relationship similar to that of a brother and sister. The GBF is your sister from another mother, and the family member that you have chosen for yourself. And like with any other brother-sister relationships, there will always be lines you can’t cross (e.g., changing in front of each other or holding hands just because). Like you just don’t do that with your sister, no matter how close you’ve become.

Also, like with any brother and sister, there is a degree of respect and gentlemanliness that you ought to uphold. GBFs are not bros who you can get physical with; slap around in their privates, or wrestle out of boredom; neither are they hos who you can take advantage of and simply throw out the window.

GBFs are your emotional rock; the friend who would be happy to give you a shoulder to cry on whereas your male best friend would cringe or freak the hell out. “That’s so gay, man!” The GBF will also give you the female vantage point on matters like fashion, relationships, and other pursuits that your male best friend would have a hard time articulating. “Corduroy? Umm… ya! Just wear whatever!” In short, the GBF is someone who’ll represent a side to your humanity that you can’t ignore or aren’t so in tune with, and unlike a girlfriend, is never in danger of being out of your life should you screw up. At the end of the day, your friends after all, and if you’re truly friends, you’ll be there for each other no matter what.