Friends
Posted on January 30, 2016 by bob in EdNote
Yesterday I accompanied a dear friend to the hospital for a routine outpatient test. Nothing serious, thankfully, but her light anesthesia required a warm body in the waiting room, a driver to take her home, and someone intelligent enough to comprehend the doctor’s parting instructions (two outa three ain’t bad). In the hour we spent waiting for her to be called back, we talked about what women always seem to discuss: relationships, our three-decade friendship, and the transitions we’d experienced within our families. The last one struck a chord.
We were young mothers in our 30s when we first met, after I resolved to introduce myself to the mom of the most well-mannered third grader in my son’s class. We clicked immediately, bound by children who were the same age, a similar world-view, and loving and dedicated husbands who endured long work days to secure a financial foundation for our fledgling families.
Devoted to our children, my friend and I spent countless hours together contemplating the challenges of young parenthood. “Do you have this week’s spelling words?” “When is Billy’s birthday party?” “I’ll pick up the kids this afternoon if you can get them tomorrow…” Life was consumed with doctor’s visits, bedtime stories, and organized sports, with time somehow miraculously carved out for jobs, meal preparation and laundry in between.
Our own parents, still full of vitality, remained an integral part of our lives. Mature enough to appreciate their sacrifices, we laughed together about the idiosyncrasies of the nuclear families in which we were raised. We didn’t know it then, but our mettle would not be fully tested until the parents we once depended on would, to varying degrees, become dependent on us.
Sitting together in the waiting room my friend and I acknowledged how much our lives have changed. What seemed forever in coming is now long behind us.Those loving, capable grade schoolers have grown into loving, capable, adults. Our parents are no longer with us, and while the once-filled nests have occasionally felt achingly empty, the unanticipated joy of grandchildren now fills our hearts.
For most of us, family — and the security it represents — is central to our life journey. As children, our family is our world. We take it for granted as teenagers, reconnect to it as twenty-somethings, and finally begin to understand its value to our lives during our 30s, 40s and 50s. By the time we reach our 60s we’ve come full circle — longing for that ubiquitous, caring environment where we feel nestled, nurtured, and loved.
Along the way, if we’re lucky, we have the good fortune to gather a few individuals who join our journey and gain admission to our extended family. They share our joys and help us bear our burdens.
I’m lucky to have a few of these self-selected family members. They are my lifelong friends, and like my family, they add immeasurable value to my life.
Sandra Polizos, Editor
primeeditor@gmail.com
