I have gained and lost a lot of friends along the way. Two of these losses were devastating and unexpected, and I doubt I will ever fully get over them. One Friendship deteriorated after an affair, and the other ended, almost without warning, with a nasty text claiming that I always play the victim and this person was more than done. I could call these people out publically, trash them and embarrass them, but that’s neither mature nor necessary. They are both, I think, decent people, and as much as these relationships meant to me, perhaps they weren’t meant to be.
Other ex-friends, I think less kindly of. To be fair, I made some shockingly poor decisions about who I let into my life, like suggesting that a virtual stranger be my roommate for the next year after a pleasant conversation in the bathroom on a break from class in undergrad. She turned out to be a little Single White Female-ish, and bad things happened. Others appeared to be great and all in, until they weren’t, seeming to turn against me totally and irrevocably. I was left feeling unloved, and unlovable. In retrospect, I think I was self-absorbed and could be demanding. I was certainly unpredictable. But I was always loyal, and always willing to be there for someone in need. That is something I pride myself on, and that never changed, so matter how much of a mess I was.
Happily, my life remains full of friends, new and old. My oldest friend is Laura, I sweetheart I met when I was only fifteen, connecting with her first because our fathers worked together. Our relationship soon took on a life of its own, with inside jokes (who likes chicken!?!?), fighting over boys, and that time I held her hair back while she threw up on a plane. She was the maid of honor at my wedding, and she was always the only person who I would ever have wanted to be. The night before my wedding, we spooned together on my futon, like the sisters we had become. She is a part of my past, a part of my home, and whenever I hear her voice it’s like we both go “yeah, so anyway…”, as the though one of us was just answering another call on calling waiting.
Diana came next, a mother I met at our local drop-in centre. I stared at her the whole time, probably creeping her out, struck by her physical resemblance to me. We bonded over stay-at-home motherhood and tight finances and shared values. A brief breakup in our friendship, instigated stupidly by me, and ended one rainy night over a glass of white wine and lots of humble pie, has only deepened our appreciation for each other. I bring her lattes, and sometimes, on a bad day, she comes over for an omelet. She has a ready laugh and open arms and she calls me Sugar Plum. I adore her.
Then there is Jenn, a brilliant nurse with a strong Christian faith and no intention of letting me get away with anything. She is Irish and I am French, so things are always calm with us, all the time. When I think of Jenn, I picture a disapproving school marm standing with her arms crossed, watching unimpressed while I engage in all kinds of ridiculous shenanigans, then dragging me by the ear into timeout for a lecture, then covering my face with kisses after. Jenn loves me enough to stand up to me, and does so often. This makes me mad, and then I understand why she has done what she has done, and I realize that she is so invested in me being healthy that she is willing to risk my wrath. She knows I always end up deciding she is right, anyway, and telling her I love her.
Finally, there is Ames-and-Maria-Danielle. I name them together, because we all lived together in university, and the bond between the four of us is so intertwined that it seems almost artificial to separate them. Ames is a business-like nurse and my daughter’s godmother, quite ready to tell me to smarten up. We have had our conflicts, she and I, both forceful firstborns rather accustomed to having our way. But we have never stopped working on our relationship, and have learned to understand each other better through the years, and I always come away from conversations with her feeling grounded and empowered and better about myself. Maria is my athletic hero, a lean mean running machine who has qualified for Boston and completed full Ironman distances, amongst other things. We competed over the furnace temperature as roommates (it WAS too hot) and bonded over our shared interest in literature. She is a quiet spirit, quirky and artistic, but gentle too. She has a special place in the hearts of all of us. Then there is my wild Danielle. Danielle introduced me to thong underwear, vodka-soaked cantaloupe, and the curious delights of running at midnight. She kicked me out of the driver’s seat of her standard when I nearly ruined her clutch, and made me laugh so hard when we lived together that my stomach ached. And, wouldn’t you know it, our fabulous rebel walked down the aisle before any of us, to the man she will grow old with.
These relationships have matured and become real treasures over time. We have gone from tired undergraduates bonding as roommates and making funny stories together, like the time Danielle bleached my hair blonde the night before a philosophy exam and took pictures of me drinking wine out of a bottle, and also of my butt. Or the time Ames and I “studied” for our exams on the rooftop of our houses and showed up well-prepared with crimson noses to our respective exam locations. But life has happened, real life, and we have loved each other through it. Breakups, marriages, deaths of parents, miscarriage, babies, career moves, health issues. Nothing is ever official until these three darlings from my undergraduate years know about it, and they feel the same way.
New relationships are coming along, too, burgeoning slowly as time and energy allow. I am more settled inside myself, less needy emotionally, so I can let them become what they become (or not). Only time will tell.
Khalil Gibran says “In the sweetness of friendships let there be laughter and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things, the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.” I am so lucky to have these wonderful women, my dear and treasured friends. Because of them, their love, our shared laughter and loyalty, my heart does find its morning. And we are all, always, refreshed. Life is made for friendships, and my life is infinitely happier and healthier and better and funnier for mine.
