By Kelly Sinon
Recently, four girls, now women, sat down for the first time, all together, in over 12 years. The group has been friends for over 30 years, drifting in and out of each other's lives as time and life brings each of them on different, yet similar paths.
Each of the women has been married. One, divorced and happily remarried (X2), One, now happily single, and two, in it for the long haul, enjoying the journey. They have 50+ years of marital experience to draw upon for solicited and friendly, unsolicited advice and collectively, between them, there are 8 children. The kids range in age from 2 to 22.
As you can imagine, anything touted as "Girls' Weekend" will have it's share of squealing with delight, somber moments, realizations and copious amounts of delicious ...and some not so delicious, (sorry about that wine, guys) alcohol.
What we were most unprepared for, was the amount of adult (no, not that kind...well, a lot of that kind, too) conversation and debates about such grown up things as infant car seat laws, drug testing for welfare recipients, real estate and immigration. I was impressed that as we grew up and formed our own opinions, none of us were so set in our way of the world, that we were unable to see another point of view. Each one of us brought to the table, our own experiences and opinions based upon them. We are friends for lots of reasons. Not the least of which is respect and interest in why/how the others think of things.
I cherish my friend who is adores anything Victoriana or WWII Land Girl and makes her own gorgeous, authentic costumes for events, and frequently has starring roles in things like the Renaissance Faire and Dickens Faire during Christmas (side note: You must mark your calendars to make a day of it in The City to go to the Cow Palace to see it transformed into Dickensean wonder, complete with snow and spiced beverages....and maybe a cheeky show, that includes beautiful girls in full costume. And by that, I mean corsets, galore. And, oh! Her son has the leading role as Oliver, this year! ).
My well-traveled friend, who has been so lucky to get to live in two European countries for years, is an amazing dessert specialist (no, seriously... she makes everything from scratch and it's all cookbook/magazine-worthy and says things like, "So, we were in Spain..." and then giggles at how pretentious she thinks it makes her sound, as a prelude to another funny or entertaining tale, while she stuffs her mouth full of nachos.
My fantastic friend, who has the motherly patience of a saint, inherited from her own mother; the kind of patience I wish I had. She has sacrificed her beautiful dining room with the stately fireplace, to act as a huge sewing room in order to make countless dresses, complete with themes, mind you, by hand for her daughter's Rainbow Girl events, and she never shies away from chaperoning the many giggling, screaming girls to out of town venues. In fact, she revels in it. She is chauffer, wife and Mom extraordinaire.
We were astonished to realize that each of us had at least one representative from our group at each of our weddings over the years, no matter where it took place. We have been present in each other's lives for major milestones; births and deaths. Sadness, confusion, joy, anger; you name it, we've been there.
Spending a weekend with friendships like that, renews my soul and reminds me that I'm not alone. These three people know me, and have known me since before I got married and had kids, a job and a mortgage. When I aced a history test, or completely failed a math class; giggled into the night and compared notes on first kisses, commiserated over bad boyfriends, snuck clove cigarettes and wine coolers, and played practical jokes on each other, our parents, and our neighborhoods.
Our Girl's Weekends can become more frequent, now that we are all (lower 48, even) stateside, finally. I think our neighborhoods should prepare themselves. The Triangle is back!
___________________________________________________________________________________
Kelly Sinon can be reached at sksinon@aol.com You can find her at Bev Mo, searching for better wine.
No comments:
Post a Comment