Sunday, November 11, 2012

Believe it or not, no alcohol was consumed in the writing of this post


This weekend, I learned a lot about friendship.

We – there’s a few of us in this together – have been doing this for over two decades. We might not see each other for a year or more, but put us in the same room and we've never been apart for more than 10 minutes. Put on the cheesy movie. Cook up a frozen pizza or a pot of pasta.  Catch up on the small stuff – and then get to the big stuff that you need to talk about with people who have known you for so long that you realize they knew you before you even had a real personality; Growing up together and figuring out life as it happens, because that’s the only way to start figuring out life. And they really are the ones who know how you got to Today.

There was a baby, when we were probably too young to even know what having a baby meant, but one of us (obviously, not me) was having one, so by God we were going to figure it out. Dealing with boys – and then men – before we knew what the difference between the two even meant, much less how to deal with the transition between the two.  Marriage, Divorce, Messy families –  before we learned that sometimes family just plain means messy and hurt feelings –and finding out that you learn a lot  about yourself when things get Messy and Hurtful. We have figured out so many Very Important Things together that we should have a freaking Nobel Prize in Life. Or at least, I assume that's what the multiple empty bottles of wine at 2 AM mean.

But most of all, friendship.

Friendship that grows from stupid boys to uninterpretable relationships to realizing that no matter what, there are some people that will always have your back. No questions asked – or at least, no questions that have wrong answers, because even bad answers are accepted. An understanding that sometimes just pouring the next glass of wine is affirming that we’re all in this together.

I think I've had the easiest path of all of us.  But I know I am lucky because we've shared the path together.

*** Seriously. No wine for me tonight. You should see the number of bottles we emptied over the past two nights.

****Also, too, inside joke: We should probably start making contingency plans for when one of us stops reacting to the volleyball scene in Top Gun. Do any of us know CPR?