Any advice on ways to meaningfully maintain long-distance friendships that aren’t just texts and voice notes? I have some of the greatest friends in the world, but the differences in time zones is really getting in the way and I miss them all the time. How do you stay connected to people you don’t see as often as you’d like?

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Josh · Answer

Snail Mail: I know it’s terribly outdated and USPS is the absolute worst, but I still endeavor to send handwritten notes, cards, stickerpacks and little thotchkes whenever possible.  I have all my friends’ and families’ addies and barfdays sabed to my phone contacts and on my calendar. I send birthday cards to adults. I send Halloween cards to their kids. I send holiday cards during Yule. When we travel I like to find cute and fun stationary shops and gift stores, hut locally printed letterpress postcards or stationery. Support local when traveling , and then you have fun things to mail folks when you get back!

Case in point, this adorable shop in Bangor Maine stocked me tf up last time we visited and I got the coolest origami stationery set from the UK. People love getting mail that’s not bills or BS commercial direct mail!

Hallie · Answer

The Filler Call: ~25yrs ago, my sister was in college and called my late father at work in the middle of the day. When he answered she said something along the lines of “Oh, I’m just walking to class,” and hopped off the call 10min later once she’d arrived. 60min later, she called him again - “Oh, I’m just walking home from class,” - and my dad chuckled, then replied “Ah, so I’m filler,” and the Filler Call® was born.

The Filler Call is quick and has no agenda. The Filler Call is usually spontaneous, but can come with a pre-text like, “Wanna be my Filler in 5m?” Related: it’s required to identify the Filler Call as such upon answering. A close friend and I have a routine where, if we miss a call from the other and we only have a few minutes, we’ll text “Filler?” so we don’t miss an opportunity for a quick catch-up. That said, there’s no guilt involved if you can’t take a Filler Call; it’s always optional.

The Filler Call is for a specific circle of friend or family: those with whom we can go deep but don’t always need to, partly because a regular cadence of Filler Calls can keep you pretty well caught up. And, if nothing else, hearing someone’s voice and popping into a few minutes of their day every so often is a special little treat on its own.

Nora Rev · Answer

Call a Friend While Cleaning the House: Instead of listening to a podcast or an audiobook, create a Custom Friend Podcast by calling friends to keep you company while cleaning, doing laundry, gardening, whatever. Boring shit has to be done, and it's way better with company!

An important part of making this work is getting CONSENT IN ADVANCE to frequently cold-call your friends in a way that doesn't feel horrifying or high-pressure. I have a long list of folks who have opted in to being Friend Podcast, and they all know the deal— that if I call them they:

- do not have to pick up, and
- do not have to call back.

When I clean, I then run down the list and ring folks until someone feels like chatting and cleaning. We both get a lot done, and hate it less. We also talk a lot more than we used to!

Emmmily · Answer

Start a book club with long distance friends: Read the same book and then facetime to discuss it! I do this with a long-distance friend and it gives us lots to text about beforehand and a great excuse to check in face to face once we’ve finished reading.

Mallory Schulte · Answer

Pick a Holiday: When my best friend moved away, we committed to celebrating Thanksgiving together each year. It’s an extended trip that has kept us close.

Anais Jaccard · Answer

The Friday Five!: Each Friday, my long distance pals and I send five pictures from our week with short captions. I love getting a peek at what their daily lives look like - the big moments and also the tiny ones. And I love having an excuse to document more of my own life.

Sarah · Answer

The relationship affirming "walk and talk": My best friend and I are in a long distance relationship, but we keep the love alive with a work-day walk and talk, almost every day Monday through Friday. This is a rec (a plea!) to call your friends!! It's usually 5-15 min. Just enough to remain deep in minutia of each others every day life. I'm sorry, but texts could never.

Click through the link for the best walking related song of all time <3

Mary · Answer

Surprise Mail: I periodically mail my long distance friends a letter and little gift if I come across something that reminds me of them. I usually do it at random times (ie not birthdays or holidays).This has helped us stay connected through the years and let’s them know I think of them even if we aren’t texting and calling often.

Courtney · Answer

marco polo app: If you get the right people on board it is truly a nourishing way to connect. It doesn’t make sense but this app is the best connector of long distance friendships. It’s a way to keep a conversation going that you can tend to at your own pace and I use it every single day to keep in touch with my nearest (emotionally) and dearest, yet farthest away core group of childhood friends.

Karli · Answer

marco polo app: i really love the Marco Polo app. my best friend moved across the country and we send each other videos all the time. sometimes we respond right away and send multiple in a day. sometimes it takes a couple days. it feels less time-sensitive than texting and more intimate than voice notes.

Bailey Fraley · Answer

Instacart: I love to send spontaneous instacarts with groceries, flowers or little things for a self care night

Christine · Answer

phone calls while doing chores: this might not work depending on the time zone difference, but truly just both putting in an earbud and then talking as you do errands or chores or whatever. my best friends is 3 hours behind and this makes it feel like we’re still “doing life” together.

Gabriela Riccardi · Answer

Watch a movie at the same time: Pick a flick, put it on the calendar, then press play on your streamer at the same time. Text throughout or debrief after!

Hannah Harvey · Answer

Randomly call a friend : time zones are tricky & i'm sending you so much love from someone in a similar boat!!! this is a little thing, but one thing i've been doing for years is calling a long-distance friend when i randomly get the urge - when i'm walking home from a night out or have a lot of meal prep to do or whatever. a lot of the time they don't answer and i get a "sorry i'm busy!" txt, but sometimes they do and we get to catch up in a spontaneous way!!! (this tactic works best for friends who don't think you're dying if you happen to call them at a weird time of day)

Very Carrie · Answer

Marco Polo chat groups: I wouldn’t be caught up with my friends without this app. It’s like talking on FaceTime but you just record yourself talking and send it along, and whenever they are free to chat back they respond with their own video. Takes the burden off of scheduling time for catch-up calls and everything is kept in a log so you can go back and rewatch

The Marco Polo app is a video-messaging platform that functions like a "video walkie-talkie". It allows users to send asynchronous video messages—called "Polos"—back and forth. Because it does not require both people to be live at the same time, it is highly popular for keeping in touch with busy friends and family across different time zones.

JaperMoon · Answer

selfie-a-day texts: A great way to stay in touch with long distance besties. You see each others faces and everyday you are on the lookout for what might make the best selfie.

I did this for a year and then printed little flipbooks of them

Izzy · Answer

Vanity Plates: My friend in NYC and I send each other silly vanity plates we see just to keep the thread going. Additionally, a shared note (if you both have iphones) of lists of >synchronicities that happen to you >magic things you encounter >a secret third thing. Those are fun too :)

anna · Answer

“Watch” a show together: Get on the hype train about a show and text while you’re watching or after you’ve both seen the ep.

D · Answer

Make stuff (art, food, whatever) with your friends across distances <3: For long-distance friendships, I love to work on projects together. This image is a scent + vessel collaboration that I began with my friend Andrew a while ago; we're still working on it. I'm finishing up on a book with my friend Sara and commissioned my friend Carlin to do a drag performance in the city where I was living, and so on.

If time zones are workable, I also love to attend friends' online lectures and events, like weekly Reiki with Kirien. I've also attended virtual events like those hosted by the Center for Sensory Studies in Montreal (linked here) with long-distance friends and then met up virtually afterwards to discuss.

Long-distance friendship can really open the world in various ways and these are just a few ways that I love to connect with friends across continents, despite some time zone math.

Emily Teague · Answer

Snail Mail: Sending buddies snail mail through the post office is one of my favorite ways to stay connected. I like putting together little care packages with things they'll enjoy. Local coffee, a book, a print, some tiny weird surprise. Then I cover the package in goofy characters like it wandered out of a middle school sketchbook. It feels like summer camp in the 90s, and the wonderfully weird things they send back always make my day

Jenn · Answer

(Online) Game Night!: This one is like Pictionary.

Wavelengths would work too I think!

Anniebraves · Answer

The StoryGraph App: A graphically pleasing, cool data crunching app with a WOC founder. Love it as single place to store all my to reads and geek out over my reading trends. This is also a great way to stay connected to long-distance friends. At the start of the year, I invited my friend who lives across the country to join so we can see what the other is reading. She recently texted me asking if I would recommend to her the book I just finished or the one I am currently reading.

Sydney · Answer

Create a friends newsletter with Letterloop: This app is a great way to stay in touch and up-to-date with the lives of your long distance friends. You can select the questions and respond in your own time, the frequency is up to you — honestly, it is set up SO well for friends in different time zones. Even if you do other things to stay in touch, receiving a friends newsletter in your inbox is always such a treat. Plus, the team is super responsive to requests for improving the app!

helen · Answer

marco polo app: I love this app for keeping in touch with friends. I will say that I’ve tried it with a couple folks (my beloved brother, for example) and they said it “wasn’t for them”… apparently it’s not for everyone. But it IS for some people. Best of luck! Worth the effort.

Catherine Davis · Answer

Love letters: Letter writing is truly a lost art. Tell them how you feel. I’ve saved every one I’ve ever received. Tied up with a ribbon in a box under my bed. Just hits different than a folder of saved emails…

Catherine Davis · Answer

Handmade postcards: Cut, paste, add stickers,fancy papers or whatever you have to make it cute!