Edited Version Published as "Freinds Revisied" at www.midlifecollage.com
The snowy wind blustered past me as I struggled to the commissary doors. It was always a circus in the winter in Minot, North Dakota to manage my grocery shopping. The prep work was strenuous.
Grocery List: check.
Coupons: check.
Purse with ID: check.
Parka: check.
Scarf: check.
Full Hat with only eye opening: check.
Ear muffs: check.
Gloves: check.
Mukluks: check.
Snow shoveling to garage: check.
Unhook battery heater: check.
Traveling to purchase the bare necessities was less than 2 ½ miles from my house and could take over thirty minutes from start to finish in prep and travel time to arrive in the dead of winter. But one afternoon, it changed my life forever.
It was 1983. I was very far away from my southern home of Montgomery, Alabama; newly married and lonesome. Venturing out on the desolate roads of the air force base and having to undo the parka, scarf, full hat with only eye opening, ear muffs and gloves in order to shop, I began my task at hand. Filling my shopping cart as meticulously and quickly as possibly and savoring the warmth of the store, I gather the basics and the super essentials. You must always have extra candles, toilet paper, crackers, canned soup, canned milk, bread, eggs and anything frozen because if the power goes out - Mother Nature’s own freezer is right outside your door.
So I am in the meat department and I run into a fellow wife. Our husbands work together and she is with another woman. Both are pregnant. Mona introduces me to Nettie and I ask her where she is from originally. Montgomery, Alabama.
A friendship began and blossomed 2000 miles away from home with someone from home. A woman, nine years my senior, who was the baby of her family, became the big sister to the girl who was the oldest in hers. I became pregnant and we were mommies together. Later, we were single mommies together back in Alabama and then Florida. Our friendship endured moves, birthdays and holidays, cancer, hurricanes, heartbreaks and weddings.
And one day the endurance could no longer endure. Rock solid had become rocky. We severed ties. It was harsh and painful. The fifteen year friendship, our sisterhood, ceased. It was devastating. It was out of love. It was necessary.
Years passed. Memories and emptiness increased. There were tough times. Events you want to share with your best friend were kept locked away internally and eternally.
Social networking is a crazy beast. The re-connections with your past are often just pleasantries. I have found so many people from my childhood but never anyone from my adulthood. Scared? A little.
A couple of years ago, I was blessed with a mini-sabbatical in the Smokey Mountains, I had a magnitude of time to reflect, write and research. Finally brave enough to search for my Net. It took a little work but I found photos of her, a new husband and grandchildren through her daughter’s page. Yes, I was creeping. I didn’t friend request her daughter though; Nettie was not on Facebook. So I let it rest. She was still alive, blessed with two beautiful grand babies and looked so happy. That was enough.
For the moment.
Another year passed. I couldn’t resist the urge to scout her out once more. Ding! Ding! Ding! I found her. I took a deep breathe and sent her a friend request. She responded immediately. For nearly a year, we had lived sixty three miles apart in the Great Smokey Mountains! That was over a year ago that we reconnected. She’s in Tennessee and I am now in Georgia again.
Since that moment of reuniting, we have once again shared laughs and tears. Gone through more cancer scares, welcomed her new grand babies and raised money for her older grandchildren with a rare disease. We have watched football games long distance and spent New Year’s Eve together for the first time in over a decade. Trip number two is planned and booked already for next month.
Although so much time had passed, we are like school girls. Taking that journey away from each other was worth coming together again. We are stronger, more tolerant and more understanding of each other. There is nothing like true friendship. There is nothing like overcoming the past in order to soar into the future together as best girlfriends almost thirty years later. There is nothing like forgiveness. We are so lucky.
