The word “friend” is defined by the Webster dictionary as one attached to another by affection or esteem or a favored companion. When I was growing up, it took time to build friendships. First, you met that person, face-to-face, and would eventually decide that this is someone you could be around again because you might have something in common. It took time to build that relationship whether it started in the playground, a sorority/fraternity or perhaps working together. Today, you can send someone an online “friend request” without ever having met them and instantly become connected when they accept it. I’ve been blessed with friendships dating back to my childhood. I’ve met friends through college. I’ve built friendships with colleagues from work.
I’ve had friends since elementary, middle and high school that I’ve kept in my life like family. You know who you are: JoAnn, Shelly, Sarah, Molly, Lisa, Robin. From being kids to adulthood through marriages, careers, children, moving away, we stayed in touch. It’s a bond that cannot be broken – we’re family. We grew up together and we remain together.
I’ve made friends in college who are my sisters. Heather and Amy and I could look back on our years in Pittsburgh and wonder at times how we got out of situations alive. Hysterical memories infused with adventures in drinking and surviving college life away from the watchful eyes of our parents. Years later, we’re married with children but we fondly look back to our days of youth and finding our next adventure as that person inside of us never grows old.
I moved far away to Florida and grew up a bit. Partying slowed down a little and I began to focus on my career. I made many friends many friends in FL. Those friendships, starting out as professional colleagues, eventually led to sharing a drink after work on a Friday evening or working on a special project and getting to know each other in a different light. Nancy, Angela, Wanlee, Sandy, Suzanne, Kathy, and Mary Kay became my work family, eventually becoming close confidants outside of work. I made friends through social gatherings: Julie and I have been friends for over 18 years. These relationships progressed into close bonds that continue even as I moved up to North Carolina.
I’ve had to stand by and watch friends get hurt through a divorce, a death in the family, a sick child or betrayal by another friend. I’ve tried to help pick up the pieces, but I learned being a friend did not mean saying or doing, but listening. Just being a set of ears or a shoulder to cry on can be most powerful. Being a friend means never saying I told you so, never offering unsolicited advice.
I’ve watched friends die. My friend from college, Candy, was diagnosed with a brain tumor shortly after we graduated from Point Park University. It was a shock when we found out. When I was in my early twenties, I thought we were invincible. Cancer can’t find us – that happens to other people. Candy, this beautiful, tall red-head who made me laugh one Halloween when we went to a party and she was dressed as the Chiquita woman. I recall falling off my barstool laughing when a couple guys in our party were eating her candy-fruit earrings while she was still wearing them. She was a presence – how could she get cancer? Two days after hearing of her diagnosis, Heather, Tory and I jumped into a car and drove 12 hours to Lansing, Michigan to see her before her surgery. We didn’t know how she would come out of the OR, but we wanted her to see us before the procedure knowing we were there before she went under. Six months later, we made another trip up there to go wig shopping with her laughing our asses off at how ridiculous we looked, taking turns in front of the mirror. We enjoyed her friendship for five more years before she passed away from the disease. In our eyes, she never stopped dancing. I lost another friend this year. Andrea and I were friends in elementary school and that continued for the next three decades. She died in February 2012 of leukemia after fighting the disease for three years. She was a soldier, a wife, a mother and a friend. Both women were loved my many.
All of these friendships were alive and well before “friend requests” came along. I already knew their “info” and already had “photos” of our friendships. I wrote on some of their locker doors in high school before writing on their online “walls.”
Friendships do not end in death. They continue to live on as legacies in our hearts.
