conversely, you need friends who are younger to help introduce you to new ideas. You need friends who are younger to drag you out to try some adventure because they thought it looked cool. You need younger friends to help you fix problems, because they may have faced something similar in the past! You need younger friends to keep you up to date on slang so that you can embarrass your teenage family members by intentionally misusing it.

having friends who are older than you helps inoculate you against ageism towards older people.

It is also just a given of life. Those that are like "Why would a 40 year old ever even be near a 16 year old? Thats sus!" Have never worked a minimum wage job or gone to college, especially community college. My first year of school, I was friends with a 36 year old man with kids I was closer in age to. My senior internship was in a cardiac rehab unit and I made friends with people an average age of 65. I was often teased at being in charge of their workout plans when "I have shoes older than you". I had a 50 year old coworker last holiday season and she was great, I loved working with her.

Mr. J, I dreamed that I was taking a walk and met you and Landlady: you had learned to walk politely on a leash, and you sniffed my ankle.