(Published Jan. 31, 2012 at The LivingstonPost.com )
Driving down the main road in our neighborhood isn't the same anymore. I’ve had that feeling before – mostly when gobs of new houses would spring up, adding to the traffic and changing the once very rural character of the landscape.
Now, though, it’s different. It's the feeling of something definitely missing, something I’d taken for granted. The awareness feels strange; two of my longtime neighbors and church friends are missing from that landscape -- two, from my revered circles of friends.
In the circle of life, matters of friendship matter.
- Friendships: Matters of the Heart (mandala art from Feb. 14 2010 archives of The Daily Mandala by Henry Reed)
Friendship matters are heart matters. Why then, do we so often take friendship for granted? But then, how often do we treat matters of the heart seriously – until it’s too late? The circle of life, of friendship, of heart comes to mind as it usually does – when we least expect it.
As I drove the road on a snowy, mid-January day, I was coming home from a breakfast with friends. Inside my heart, an inner dialog was going on regarding that day’s events. The weather played its part, bringing the two events into snow-white focus. Friendships, developed over a forty-year span of time, took center stage in my mind. Circles of friends, that do matter, and the beauty of these ties of spirit, became my theme for the day.
That day my circles collided. On that day, I spent the morning with the breakfast group of friends. Four decades of friendship that seems like four years. Then, afternoon threw in a somber note, attending the funeral of my church friend and neighbor -- another four decades of friendship. Different circles, different activities, yet the friendships reflect longtime ties of spirit and heart.
It is a long time, 40 years, yet it passes in the blink of an eye. It’s easy to take friendships for granted…to assume our friends will always be there. Amazingly, one of my breakfast friends discussed similar events happening for her. Her church friend was around the week before; and now she wasn’t. Funerals loomed for both of us.
I was feeling particularly nostalgic, anyway, on that day. I’d just lost a little best friend of the critter kind. ZuZu, a tawny yellow kitten had breezed into my life four months earlier, only to make her exit the second day of the New Year. I was feeling sad, and lost, reminiscing about relationships – both the people and pets in our lives.
Funny how you start thinking of things like that, and then someone says something that triggers more memories. My husband said the pie room at our church (where the pies were served at suppers) wouldn’t be the same without Mary.
Suddenly, I found myself piping up, “You mean her sour cream raisin pie?” (That was always my favorite – in the days when you could serve cream pies at church).
Yikes, I hadn’t thought of that in ages. Then more memories began to surface. The pastor had mentioned at the service about her chickens who laid the blue eggs, and about the crocheted towels, baby blankets and quilts she made for countless friends and family. But I was thinking about the times we’d spent together at church women’s meetings; and I was even thinking way back to the time when we took sewing classes with another church friend and neighbor when I was new to the neighborhood, and they’d included me. They were next-door neighbors. Now they’re both gone; our road seems empty without them.
Among my circles of friends, my breakfast circle and my church circle have meant a great deal to me. They’ve stood the test of time. They’ve brought me great joy.
My breakfast friends were my contemporaries; our husbands worked together; our children grew up together. My neighborhood and church friends adopted me when we moved into the area. In many ways, they stood in for the elders I knew in my own growing up years from my home church and community. I discovered they’d become role models, similarly, to our kids.
Now the elder group is passing on; and we (my breakfast friends and I) find ourselves becoming the elders in our communities and in our churches. The wise elders: Who, me? How could I now be one of them, I ask? Impossible: How could I ever be like they were to me? The questions keep coming.
To everything there is a season. Yet, how do we change with the seasons? How do we say good-bye? In the landscape of my heart they are still there, these friends.
My longtime breakfast friend sent me an E-card that night. I knew we’d been mulling over the same things. The greeting was about friendships: caring for them, nurturing them, being grateful for them. It felt good to be thought of at that moment – good to know that we still have each other.
In the circle of life, friendship matters DO matter. The time we spend with friends, matters. The joy they bring to us, matters.
It helps me to think of life’s friendships as a circle. The beginnings, the endings -- and all of the middle – they’re all there, a beautiful carrousel. In my heart, the carrousel of friendship goes round and round and all of infinity contains it. It is the one giant joyride of life.
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