Who says one can't go home again. I do with my annual reunion in my home town of Austin. It is hard to believe but this trio have been friends for more than sixty years; two of them for more than 66 years. And we still have such a good time together. I married following my junior year at UT and the other two married after graduation and we are still married to the same great guys who seem to have a great time together at our annual get togethers. We bring pictures from high school slumber parties, junior high year books and laugh and giggle and gossip all over again. Next meeting we have agreed to bring our wedding albums. We feel so fortunate to still be healthy enough to get together and share our many blessings as we toddle into our elder years. We grew up in a post war age...after WWII and before Korea, a time of magic and dreams at the budding stage of women's liberation when the Ladies Home Journal was telling us to wrap ourselves in cellophane to greet our husbands at the door while our college degrees told us that we were fully capable of doing anything we wanted. We three have rasied families, had careers, have volunteered in our communities, cared for aging or ill parents and have traveled widely on the planet. We still find each other interesting and wise. We have traded sodas and cookies for wine and cheese but never have lost our desire for good chocolate (that is a given, right?).
There was no organ recital of our aches and pains though I know we have them but some honest discussion of our plans and concerns about the last stages of our lives, where we will live, who will care for us and what we would like when we make our transitions to our next life. How many people do you know that you can have these honest discussions with? I consider it a mark of friendships with deep roots. We do go way back...we loved not only our own parents but each others. I knew their siblings and envied them for having some. One still has her precious mother alive, now 97. We tease her about her good genes.
I am so grateful that I grew up in basically the same neighborhood all my life...3 different houses but the same neighborhood and my friends had the same experience. We had to grow up and move on to experience how the rest of the world lived and worked but we were secure in our sense of self and place no matter where we ended up. What a gift!
2 comments:
I testify that all you say is true. My life story is so opposite but I relate to you all as if we were quadruplets. Does growing up in that magical time allow us that luxury?
You are lucky, Kay! So incredibly lucky. There's nothing so valuable as a real friendship and nothing that fills the hunger so much as real conversation with people you're not afraid to hold anything back from. Oh my, I hope I'm in your shoes when I get to this time of life. I hooted when you said you were "toddling" into your older years. It's a good word in so many ways - not only because of the physical challenges, but also because I've seen so many older people become more like children. My Grandpa just loved to watch children and animals.
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