women

I am posting this here, hoping those who don't email might read and know how much I appreciate them:

I received an email from my sister in law that inspired me to acknowledge my women friends at this time of year. Thanks Julie, this will not do your letter justice, but here I go....

As my life has changed so dramatically over these past couple of years and I am three hundred miles away from everything and everyone I have ever known (except my husband, who, it seems, I have always known) I have missed little and regretted nothing. I miss my son most of all, but lingering in the corners of my busy busy mind, among the cobwebs and misplaced ideas and unwritten books, are my friends. The women. The sisters, buddies, in-laws, nieces, cousins, coworkers and path-mates.

Julie spoke of the impossibility of naming, at this time in life, (halfway already, can you believe it?) a "best" friend. You are all the best. I am blessed to count so many among those who have been willing to put up with me over the years.... and, having lived in one place for so long, I have the great advantage of having people who know me, who I have allowed to know me, for a long, long time. Not everyone has that. You have seen me through this life, drunk and sober, rich and poor, single and married and all that lies between. You have watched my foot-stomping resistance to change--always for the better... eventually. Many times, you had to believe for me, to push me, to see my little sanctuary in Talent as a beautiful prison, empty without someone to share it with. But that sanctuary had to be built -- and torn down in its own time. Creating it allowed me that time that so many women are denied, to come to know who I am, alone. But Lorretta said it best (as she so often does) "...its like learning to play an instrument from a book. You can't hear the notes. Eventually you gotta get out there."

I wish all of you just some of the happiness and depth of experience I have known. I wish the next year would open your heart like ripe fruit, that you will take the time to see who you are, at you most essential. I have spent a great deal of time and money to know what Dorothy knew at the end of the journey: that it was always right here. And the shopping was fun along the way, but my life today, my sweet and simple life, needs little decoration. It is whole.