Friendships...

At the age of 31, I note that I have gone to five primary schools, two secondary schools and one college. I have lived in 3 major cities and two countries (Canada and Kenya).

With all of that moving around from school to school, from city to city and now from one country to another country, I have a lot of friends…and a lot of memories.

My primary school years are mostly filled with memories of my friend Kelly. We met in a small little town when I was four years old. We went to school together, played dolls together, and listened to endless hours of Air Supply tapes together. I then moved away, but the friendship remained. Even to this day, we can go months without seeing each other or even talking but when we do, we pick up right where we left off. We can laugh and cry together and reminisce about so many memories.

My secondary school years mostly consist of my best friend at that time, Kim. Especially in our last few years of high school (as the first two years I was at a different school and didn’t know her), we were always together. We were best friends and we even dated two guys who were best friends. We went through heart breaks and laughter together. There was the year that Italy was playing Brazil for the World Cup and Brazil won. So Kim and I drove down Erie Street (aka Little Italy) and started cheering, “Go Brazil! Woohoo Brazil!” Italians were coming out of the cafés, throwing things (cups, bottles, anything!) at Kim’s car as we drove down the main road. What we were thinking by doing that, I really don’t know…even to this day. We laughed uncontrollably as we drove away in her little blue car, that when it reached 80 km/h, the steering wheel would shake like crazy (and you had to roll up the windows in order to get the car to go 80 km/h and over – the wind blowing in the car was torture on the poor engine). My parents adored her; I adored her. We then moved in together for our first year of university and unfortunately, that was a rough year for us. It changed our friendship forever.

My college years were with my friend Shirley. Second year, we moved in together. It was so much fun; she was so much fun. She was a country girl; I was a city girl. For the first time in my life, on the way to visit her hometown, I saw a cow run. Who’d a thought I would be so excited about seeing a cow run?!?!? That’s the city girl for you. I feared getting flat tires when I drove as I was always driving on the highway from the city I lived in to the city my family lived in. Then out in the country, I was driving along with Shirley and her sister Debbie and I started to hear this noise. They immediately said, “Hey Mere, you have a flat tire.” I was freaking out and then realized that they were laughing hysterically. I was only driving over the grooves in the road for the truck drivers to let them know there is a stop sign ahead (for you country folk, you know what I’m talking about). Shirley and I lost our friendship due to something silly on my part….but thanks to the world wide web, we got in contact again and all was forgiven.

After college, I started working full-time. This is where I met Deb & Lisa. Deb and I worked at the same place and we really got to know each other when I would use the phone by her front desk to call this guy during my breaks or lunch hours. Then over time, we became friends and she introduced me to Lisa. The three of us did a lot of things together; they especially helped me through a crappy, low period in my life. Deb had gotten married and moved away with her husband and yet, we always kept in contact…going camping a couple times a year, spending New Year’s Eves and birthdays together. Deb was always good that way. Lisa and I still lived in the same city and we would go for drives on the weekend. We’d turn up the music really loud, roll down the windows and just drive. Deb & Lisa were there for me when I realized I needed a change of life and I quit my job, packed up my things and moved to the big, big city. They are true gems.

After moving to the big, big city, I became good friends with Catherine (who was like mom to me) and Rhonda, my sweet best friend. Catherine helped me find my way back to the path that I needed to be on and Rhonda, her and I shared the love and passion of checking out Africa together. We spent almost 4 months together in 2005, living in a mud and grass hut outside of Eldoret. We too, went through laughter and heartaches together. We can talk about ANYTHING and EVERYTHING. She is the one person in this whole world that I can be as silly and as serious as I want to be with…and she’d join right along with me. Rhonda and I shared common struggles and frustrations and as she embarks on the next phase in her life…she’s getting married on August 2nd….I am saddened that I can’t be there for her on her very special day, like I know she’ll be there for mine. But I am so incredibly thankful that she has found the most amazing man just for her, a man that treats her the way she so deserves. I am so excited for her as she embarks on this new and exciting phase in less than a week – called marriage!

Overall, I’m not perfect; I’ve done stupid things to cause friends to be mad at me; to lose friendships and needing to do what I could to restore them. I’ve also been one to get my heart broken over friends who’ve chosen their boyfriends at that time over our friendship; friends who’ve gotten married and had children and maybe slowly realized that me being single and them being married and having baby talk times; we just weren’t on the same page and so we started to drift apart. I’ve had a male friend that turned in to something more; him moving away to go to school. But it still left things changed, hearts sadden and tears shed.

I look at friendships and think they shouldn’t be too difficult. Yes, there are disagreements; yes, there are hurt feelings but its all part of the growing. Friendships aren’t meant to be one-sided, where one makes so much effort and the other sits back and waits to be called.

Friendships shouldn’t be put in clubs. My favorite is the unspoken “Married (and possibly with children) Club”. The unspoken thoughts of: “Well you’re single and I’m married (with or without children); therefore we don’t have anything in common. I’m going to hang out with married couples (who also may/may not have children) from now on.” What was the basis of the friendship before? Was it superficial?

I love friendships; I love building relationships. My heart aches at the losses of them, whether the loss is my fault or not. Every one of my close friends from primary school to Daniel here in Africa, impacted my life in some way or another. The memories with these people will last a lifetime. No matter what “stage” I’m at in my life, I choose to continue to love my friends, to value them, to respect them and be there for them.

We need friends - women we need to have girlfriend time; and men need to have their male bonding time -whether we’re single or married (and yes, single woman and married woman can be friends with each other!). It doesn’t matter. Don’t we need to value our friends more? Don’t we need to know that our friends will be there when we need them? Don’t we want to be the type of friend that others can count on?

I messed up on some friendships in the past; but these past few weeks, as I’ve sat back and thought of certain friendships, I’ve realized that I miss a few of them. With some of them, I only have the memories, whether it be in a song, a rainfall or a picture. There are people who mean/meant so much to me, who taught me so much and whom I’ll cherish in my heart forever. And to those of you, I thank you. Thank you for the memories.