Friends Are A Blessing...

Friends are a blessing...no doubt about it...if you have friends then you have it all...someone to talk with, cry with, laugh with, exercise with, watch TV with, shop with, cook with, travel with,...you get the idea.

So... I read an article the other day written by a woman who said she was thinking about those most important friends in her life that have melted away...people that she considered BFFs or Besties at the time but that she no longer contacts or communicates with...she said that they just didn't have that much in common anymore and ran out of things to say...
For example she wrote about those women whose children went to nursery school with her children...they shared play dates, coffee, shopping, even went out to dinner and parties with each other and their husbands when their kids were in school together...but then the kids grew older, went to different elementary schools, and they kind of lost touch...

I too have had many wonderful friends that I have shared this kind of fun with...3 children, 2 husbands, 12 household moves, and 39 years later I have left a trail of very, very special women in my life that I just never hear from anymore...Diane in Boise, Idaho who took me camping in a tent and showed me how to shoot a gun...all she ever did was shake her head and say she never met anyone like me before...and all i did was tell her camping to me was black and white television and shooting was something we did late at night in dark bars with cute boys and shots of vodka.

Betty in Houston who was my daily devoted tennis partner, spoke with a funny accent and was madly in love with my (then) husband...God, I should have let her have him...or Marcia in Indianapolis who dressed in gingham dresses and had recipe cards with her formal engraved name on them...but we carpooled, played racquetball together and she loved to hear me curse!

My friend Mary and I raised our older kids together...grades 1 through 8...we saw each other just about every day through sports and school...sitting in gym after gym after gym cheering for each other's children...Friday nights sitting in her kitchen playing cards, smoking cigarettes, and drinking vodka tonics...talking about every thing under the sun from underwear to cramps...from old parents to new cars...from bratty kids to annoying teachers...from Harry Chapin to rap music...and then one day we moved about 5 miles away and I had a baby and got a divorce and then she was gone... our children grew up and every once in awhile we say hi on Facebook...and it will never be the same...but I will never, ever forget her and the years we spent together... 

My college room mate the beautiful Rosanne who was the maid of honor at my first wedding...we lived together for 3 years and  shared everything together...clothes, classes, heartaches, gossip and falling in love and getting married...we try and try and try to stay in touch and visit each other but the years have taken a toll on our friendship...she lives in California, stayed gorgeous, and enjoys a lifestyle that I can only watch from afar...and visa versa...I miss her and love remembering how we would laugh and cry together about mean girls and dumb boys!   

I am blessed to have many, many women in my life today...so many more that I could mention and probably will some day...female family and friends that I treasure, enjoy and admire...I believe with all of my heart that I am who I am because of all of these remarkable women that have and are still leaving their mark on me...KT has wonderful friends too...neither one of us has a sister...but we both feel like we got to pick our own!!

Friendship

I went shopping with my 2 of my girlfriends today...we sat at lunch and I told them my latest drama and mapped out my plans for another new future...I had forgotten how good it is to be with people who just loved me because they always have. We had so much fun going in and out of stores and laughing about what would work for me or them...what I would wear as opposed to them...SUCH differences among three women that have been friends for 45 years! Sometimes they drive me crazy and sometimes I need to be alone...but most times I need to be with them for some nurture, some tears, some laughter, some reminiscences and, of course, some juicy gossip.
Please know that when I die it will be my female friends that carry me to my grave. They carried me all the way through my life and I know they will carry me out the way I want...with humor, respect, and a "bedazzled" coffin!
From the time my KT was a young girl I always emphasized to her that her female friends were critically important to her development as a female and to never dis the girls for the boys...and I know she listened. She has always been a true and loyal friend...even when she was incredibly disappointed because her friends had put the boys first she has hung in and worked at being a good friend.
I love her friends. I have so much fun seeing them together laughing and singing and talking about cooking, their mothers (ouch), their sex lives, the Justin Timberlake concert and, of course, some juicy gossip. So, the topic today is female friendship...over rated or under sold? What do you think?