This, my friends, is something I used to not appreciate nearly enough. I had exactly two best friends all through high school. Before Facebook, they were the only ones from my high school I kept in contact with.
Then, and sometimes even now, I found it much easier to strike up a conversation with boys than girls. I can't really explain why, but it does explain that even though I was generally painfully shy, I did manage to have high school boyfriends.
After college, Darrell and I made a group of couples friends. We were fresh out of college starting our new careers, all but one couple without kids yet. There were a few singles we socialized with also, but mostly it was that core group of couples friends, one set from college and the others either transplants like us or locals to the Detroit Metro area. We played board games on Friday nights, went out to dinner together. They were the ones who would visit or even drive Darrell home sick from work when he was fighting Hodgkin's lymphoma. They even helped us move away when the time came. I would sometimes do things separately with the ladies, but it wasn't quite a cohesive group of ladies friends.
My first real dip into a group of adult girlfriends came by joining a playgroup with my daughter the few years I stayed home with her. Those ladies saved my sanity! Talking to them about what we were all going through as generally first-time mommies was the best therapy imaginable, and quite reasonably priced as well. Their children became my daughter's first friends, but I am the one who remembers them and knows that they had a leading role in making that first year enjoyable, and perhaps even saving my marriage, probably without even realizing it. I haven't kept in touch as well as I should, but they still mean the world to me.
The next time something similar happened, it took seven years to build in Lexington. For the first time in my life, I became a real part of a network of friends, mostly girlfriends. We carpooled our kids to activities, filled in at bus stop pickups, cheered each other on in going back to work/changing jobs, talked about our husbands, had book clubs and game nights, let my daughter watch their young sons, watched our kids (generally boys somehow) grow up together and play soccer/basketball/join cub scouts/etc. together, had Bible study together, hosted/attended various family gatherings, trick-or-treated together, had girls-nights-out together, even went on a cruise together. I could go shopping at Target or Kroger and maybe even run into one of them there.
And for the first time in my life, I felt like I perhaps could not live without my friends. Before, I'd always thought it might be Darrell and I against the world, with the help of our families. Now I realized that we could call in reinforcements from so many more. I cared about these ladies. They cared about me.
Which might explain why I'm so darn excited that several of them are coming to visit me this weekend! I've been so happy I've nearly been skipping around my house, definitely not typical Jennifer behavior. I'm more excited to go to the grocery store for them than I have been in... (well, perhaps ever?)
Those two friends from high school? Yes, I still love them, too! One of them is coming this weekend, too. Lifelong friends that you can pick up the phone and catch up with anytime are priceless, and I won't give them up for anything, probably more so now that I realize more about the true value of friendship.
I'll always remember the little girl who wandered the grade school playground with no one to play with, who was too shy to ask to join others already playing. I'm glad she's been blessed with more friends than she ever imagined as an adult. Thank you, girlfriends, you are each amazing!
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