Friendship

As I write today's blog, I'm reminded of what this picture, a favorite of mine, means to me. It shows true friendship, caring, tenderness, loyalty, perserverance and love. Haven't we all wanted a friend like that? Have we been a friend like that?

I look back over the years to the first friend I ever had, Patty, a girl who grew up only a few doors away from me and went to school with me in the early years. Long since moved away, we still keep in touch perhaps not as often as I'd like. Later, I would meet another friend, Diane, who would share so many of the same interests with me, almost like soul sisters. Many sleepovers, and fun times shared, as our vivid imaginations would carry me through some extremely rough times growing up.

 A cousin of mine would become a friend, a cousin who I admired, almost to the point of idolizing, and lost touch with.  Then the friendship of a girl I met in my later years, Goldie, a girl who was my high school pal as we chuckled and shared stories about boys.

To this day, I know can still count on, still tell my deepest hopes and dreams to some of them.

Many other friends would arrive between here and there. Friends who made me laugh, and others who helped me cry. Some who gave, and others who took. And now, in my later years, the warmth of older friends, people I might never have known if I hadn't taken a leap of faith and moved away from the town I grew up in.

At times my own brother has been my friend. My mom too, for in the early teenage years we laughed over stories now long gone. Beloved pets have been friend to me as well as they listened to my heart breaking and tears falling in the lonely stillness of the night.

Yes, the traits of our friends, the camaraderie, the loyalty, the willingness to listen and share. These are what we long for in our journey of life. A kindred spirit, a soul to reach out to. A giggle, a secret whispered.

We all long for frienship, and though some of us may not find it right away, there may come a time when a person is put in our path. A person who is meant to be there for us, or us, for them.
 
Thank you to all of you, my dear friends new and old, young and not so young. Thank you for what you've given me in good times and bad. Here's to all of you, mentioned and unmentioned. You have a special place in my heart.