Men kick friendship around like a football, but it doesn't seem

“Men kick friendship around like a football, but it doesn't seem to crack. Women treat it like glass and it goes to pieces.” — thus spoke Anne Morrow Lindbergh, the aviator-poet, the wife of a legend, and a thinker whose words still glide like her husband’s plane through the skies of human reflection. In this observation she did not speak in jest, but in truth, for she had witnessed the two great ways in which human hearts hold — and mishandle — the sacred bond of friendship. In men, she saw a rough endurance; in women, a fragile intensity. Each, in their own way, both preserves and destroys the thing they love.

The meaning of her words is both tender and piercing. When Lindbergh says that “men kick friendship around like a football,” she speaks of the masculine ease with which men carry their bonds. They may jest harshly, speak little of feeling, and let long months pass without meeting — yet their friendship remains, weathered but intact. It is a sturdy thing, forged in shared trials, in battlefields and labor, in laughter that asks for nothing and promises much. Like the football, it may be scuffed, dirtied, tossed aside for a season, but it endures. It is made of tough leather, not because men love less, but because they express their love through resilience, not delicacy.

But when Lindbergh continues, “women treat it like glass and it goes to pieces,” she unveils the opposite truth — that the female heart, rich in care and sensitivity, sometimes loves friendship too deeply to let it breathe. Women often hold their friendships with reverence, guarding them as precious treasures. They share secrets, tears, and dreams, weaving bonds of emotional intimacy. Yet because they treat the bond as glass — fragile, sacred, requiring perfect care — even a small misunderstanding can cause it to shatter. Their love for the friendship, though sincere, becomes its undoing. What men neglect, women sometimes protect to death.

In the story of Eleanor Roosevelt and her dear friend Lorena Hickok, this truth is made vivid. Theirs was a friendship of soul and spirit, full of letters that overflowed with tenderness and admiration. Yet as time passed, the demands of public life, duty, and unspoken fears placed strain upon that delicate bond. They both cherished it too much to treat it casually, yet too differently to sustain it without pain. What was once radiant became fragile — not because love vanished, but because it had been held too tightly. The friendship, like glass, gleamed — and broke.

Still, there is no judgment in Lindbergh’s words, only understanding. For she knew both worlds — the rough endurance of men’s camaraderie and the intricate beauty of women’s affection. She had flown across oceans, watched men face storms without a word, and she had also known the quiet, fragile trust between women who bare their souls to one another. Her wisdom was this: friendship, whether handled roughly or delicately, survives best when it is treated not as glass nor leather, but as living spirit — strong enough to endure, yet gentle enough to feel.

From her insight we learn that balance is the key. Friendship must not be so casual that it grows cold, nor so careful that it suffocates. It must be both flexible and sacred — able to withstand neglect yet worthy of reverence. True friendship, like the human heart, must breathe. It must be tested, it must sometimes bruise, yet it must never be feared. Those who hold it loosely out of faith, and carefully out of love, will find it endures the years, as both football and glass cannot.

So here lies the lesson for us: be neither careless nor fearful in friendship. Do not abandon those who are loyal simply because time or words have changed. And do not guard every feeling so tightly that the bond cannot bend. If your friend is distant, reach out without pride. If they offend you, forgive before the silence hardens. For friendship, like all sacred things, is strongest when it is allowed to be human — imperfect, enduring, and alive.

Let us, then, remember the wisdom of Anne Morrow Lindbergh: that friendship is not a game nor an ornament, but a shared flight of souls. It may be kicked by fate or cracked by care, but it survives through the warmth of those who keep faith. Treat it with both strength and tenderness, and it shall carry you — not as a football, not as glass, but as wings through the storms of life.