Robert Hruzek’s monthly What I learned from… group writing projects have taxed my brain in the past but this one takes the cake. He has give 18  - yes you read that correctly -  topics to choose from as a “mash up”  for which I read a mix and match. Never one to shirk a challenge I decided just to go for all 18. Here goes.

In fact I sort of started with my post earlier this week about Stepping outside my comfort zone as in that post I was talking about the very friends who are once again the subject of a post on my blog.

I met these 5 lovely ladies at school. Two of them I knew from Primary School days ( age 5 - 11) and the other 3 I met when we started high school  - in 1969 and we have been friends ever since. On leaving school we all followed different career paths and 25 years ago we started our monthly “Girls’ Night” get togethers which have become legendary amongst relatives , other friends and work colleagues. We are sure that this arrangement has lasted so long because we always put the date of the next night in the diary ( in fact we now do it 2 months in advance to keep things rolling).

When we hit the big 40 we started to take trips away together too. Although some of us had been on holidays together in couples we had never been away as a whole group up to that time. Our first momentous trip was to Dublin and we have since travelled by planes, trains and automobiles ( aka cars this side of the ocean!)

For a while one of our number lived overseas. This was no obstacle though - we could get over that by writing to her each month when we were together telling her what we were talking about as and when it happened ( it must have been interesting for her to read a week as the person tasked with the writing also had to cope with a couple of glasses of wine and supper).  How much easier that would have been now with the new technology!

We have differing ideas of what to do for recreation but on our latest weekend spent amongst the mountains in the Highlands of Scotland we were just happy in each other’s company. The cabin we used had a television and we took some movies on DVD but in the main we kept it simple and bought in some food, shared a glass of wine together and just chatted and reminsced - using the time and space to just recall some of our shared memories.

During visits to each other’s homes over the years we have kept up to date with the development of our children  ( and some of their pets - a particulary frisky dog and a lively hamster come to mind) who are now all young adults. My own daughter keeps up to date with her school friends too and I wonder if we have set a great precedent!

What I learned from staying in touch with my friends all these years is that

  • with a bit of organisation it does not take much effort to stay in touch
  • sharing each other’s ups and downs has made our friendships even stronger
  • there is always something new to  find out  about someone you have known all your life
  • years don’t age us - maybe we have a few wrinkles but our attitude is resolutely young

And I would like to say that  for all sorts of reasons these ladies are my heroes.