Many of our readers know that, in their country, a man and woman often do not know each other until after they are married. But this is also true in America…

It may take years for couples to really know one another. Relationships of any kind, and especially “intimate” relationships, require good communication if they are to flourish.

A funny story has it that a divorce lawyer was contacted by a woman who wanted to hire him to represent her. He wanted to get more information, so he asked her if she had grounds. She said, “Yes, we have about an acre and a half.”

“No, you don’t understand what I mean,” he said. “Do you have a grudge?”

“No,” she answered, “but we have a covered driveway that seems to work well.”

He forged on. “I’m not talking about your property, ma’am. I’m talking about your marriage. For instance, does your husband beat you up?”

“No. I generally get up before he does,” she said.The lawyer replied in frustration, “You don’t understand at all what I mean here! I want to find the reason why you came today. WHY do you want a divorce?”

She said, “I DON’T want a divorce! My husband wants the divorce. He says we can’t communicate.”

All close relationships require good communication. They begin with KNOWING each other — as fully as possible. Then comes UNDERSTANDING. And from understanding, grows ACCEPTANCE. Finally, from acceptance comes something vital to any significant relationship, including marriage — FRIENDSHIP.

As someone beautifully wrote:

“A friend is someone who knows you as you are, understands where you’ve been, accepts who you’ve become and still gently invites you to grow.”

Friends like that are rare, indeed. But it all begins with knowing the other, for at the heart of friendship is communication. And is there anything better than to be truly known, understood and accepted? That time invested in good communication today will pay big dividends in lasting friendship tomorrow.

Have you ever wondered where your friends are? Have you ever wondered what happened to your friendship? I used to have delusions about friendship. When I was younger, I thought all my friends back then could still be my friends until the day I die. I would say I was blessed with so many friends. I was able to build friendships from all the offices and organizations that I’ve been. Now that I’m in my 30’s, I can count my true friends in my fingers.

Would you judge me that I am not a friend keeper, or would you agree with me that as we grow older, we’re no longer concerned with the number of friends that we have, but with the quality of friendship that we build. It matters not who came first, but who stayed until the end.

Upon reflecting the friends that I have and once had and the friendships that we built through the years, I’ve realized quite a number of things. Let me list down ten of those realizations. I realized:

1. That betrayal of trust is the number one reason that breaks the friendship.

2. That sometimes friendship falls apart for no major reason at all. You just simply outgrow each other.

3. That distance is not a hindrance to a friendship if you really love and treasure each other.

4. That you can have more than one best friends.

5. That when you’re down in the dumps, a word, a smile, and a hand from your friend can bring you back to life.

6. That common values and interests between friends make the bond stronger.

7. That a true friend will always be happy and proud of your accomplishments and will always share with your joys as well as your sorrows.

8. That a true friend will never be tired of saying a prayer or two for you.

9. That even in friendship, it takes two to tango. Both must exert the effort to keep in touch and update with each other’s lives.

10. That when you made mistakes and make a fool of yourself, a friend will not walk out on you. A true friend will be with you and will support you while you’re in the process of picking up your broken pieces.

I have realized a lot more, but the best realization that I will forever be thankful for is that in this time and age that we seldom find true friends, God blessed me with genuine ones.

What is a friend? It’s somebody who accepts you for what you are and stands by your side through thick and thin. A person can have as many as he wants, but only a few will be your best friend. Out of those few, fewer still are really true friends which are hard to come by these days. Although most of us try to be a good friend - always there to comfort and help out during rough times , celebrate their happiness, or simply hold their hand -there comes a time when you realize that you’ve been holding on too long.

Or you realize that the friendship is not really genuine, but a heavy burden that weighs you down. Letting go of a friend is never easy. Of course, you don’t want to be “that awful person who dumped his friend” ! Real friendships don’t just happen. Just as any relationship, it needs maintenance, nourishment. So, when is it time to cut a friendship loose? Evaluate your relationship: who’s the giver and who’s the taker? Are you putting aside some (if not all) of your priorities just to facilitate their needs? How long has this been going on? How much abuse are you willing to take? Ask yourself whether this person contributes something to the relationship.

No, don’t feel selfish: a little selfishness every other time only means that you love yourself too. Friendship is about give-and-take, so it’s only right that she adds something to your life. Your house is your friends’ house. She can drop by and stay the night anytime. She can even stay the whole weekend and wear your clothes and eat your food! But, how is this affecting you? Does she even care that you’re spreading your budget thin just to have enough for your kids and accommodate her at the same time?! You may not be aware that you are a victim of needing to be needed.

It has always been YOU YOU YOU YOU! You buy lunch; she eats off everything from the plate. You go somewhere together; you always pay for gas (even for the bus ticket). She needs somebody to pour out her pains with, so you stay up late to hear her out. But when you need somebody, she’s simply not there. Are you willing to pay the price for this friendship? Your friend bleeds you dry, and that’s not a sign that she truly cares for you. It’s crystal clear that she only cares of what you can do for her now.

Wake up and smell the coffee, hon. It won’t be a shocking surprise if she dumps you first. Have you had enough? In this world you can have friends…or you can have true friends. There are givers as well as takers. Know who gives and who’s always there looking for a handout. A true friend will only seek your highest potential and be happy with what you achieve. Friends who only get what they can get and keep you from being your true self is not really a friend at all. Having a lasting friendship is the best gift anybody can have.

It sure is great to have a lot of friends. But nothing beats having one true friend that you can count on than having lots of friends who will only share your happiness but never your burdens. Look at your fingers and count your true friends. It’s amazing that you’ll find only a few.

There is no doubt that love and friendship are the two most important feelings in human life that makes us happy and give meaning to our life. If a man has no love and no friend in this world, he can surely have no happiness and joy in life. Yet, it is also a truth that most of our miseries and pain are also due to the mistakes we make in selection of friends and love. The poem “Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind” by William Shakespeare expresses this feeling beautifully.

Blow, blow, thou winter wind

Thou art not so unkind

As man’s ingratitude;

Thy tooth is not so keen,

Because thou art not seen,

Although thy breath be rude.

Heigh-ho! sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly:

Most friendship if feigning, most loving mere folly:

Then heigh-ho, the holly!

This life is most jolly.

A famous proverb says “God save me from my friends - I can protect myself from my enemies.” Why do we fail to select the right person as our lover or our friend? Why are we not able to retain our love and friendship for long? Do we really know the meaning of love and friendship?

Love and Friendship

Most of us are unable to distinguish between love and friendship. We often expect our lovers to become our friends and friends to love us. The result is confusion as friendship and love are not only different but they are opposite to each other in a very interesting way. Samuel Taylor Coleridge said,

“Sympathy constitutes friendship; but in love there is a sort of antipathy, or opposing passion. Each strives to be the other, and both together make up one whole.”

We make friends based on logic and reason. The most important thing that we look in our friends is the similarity of thoughts or the meeting of the mind. People can not become friends, if their thoughts have no meeting ground. Friends share common thoughts and common mind.

Thus you know the thoughts of your best friends even without his saying so. In the same way your friends are also aware of your thoughts. Often a friend knows you even better than you. Frances Ward Weller said,

“A friend can tell you things you don’t want to tell yourself.”

However, love is just opposite. Unlike friendship which needs reason, love is automatic and natural. It just happens. If you love a person, you simply fall in love without knowing any reason for it. That is why people call love as blind. Though, if you are a logical person, you would soon be able to find some reason for falling in love, yet these logics are nothing more than justification for you falling in love.

The cause of love is not reason but spiritual. Khalil Gibran, a famous poet expressed this mystery of love in following words

It is wrong to think that love comes from long companionship and persevering courtship. Love is the offspring of spiritual affinity and unless that affinity is created in a moment, it will not be created for years or even generations.

Thus the attraction of love is automatic just like the attraction of north and south poles of the magnate or the positive and negative charges of material. It is so because nature has designed it that way and no human being can have any control over it. You just can’t resist the forces of attraction of love. As far as the reasons for the love is concerned, they are often cooked up to justify the love to the outside world.

Friendship: The Physical Reaction

The foundation of friendship is thought. Hence when the thoughts of the friends get changed, the friendship is bound to be affected. For example, if you are a person of simple habits and integrity, you are likely to have friendship with people of similar thoughts and habits. If your friend becomes drunkard, dishonest and cheat, you would find it difficult to continue with the friendship as now your thoughts are different than your friend. No honest man can ever have genuine friendship with a dishonest or criminal.

One of the hardest realities of the world is that we all keep on changing in our lives based on our experience with the world. Our mind is continuously in the state of evolution. The thoughts of most children are similar, and hence they have no difficulty in making friends even with strangers. Adults, however, find it extremely difficult to make friends as their thoughts have become quite different from others based on their experiences and nature and hence it become difficult to find friends particularly in a different or competing professions. Most friends of adults are often from the same profession as they share common thoughts.

However, even in the same profession, the value of the person keeps on changing depending upon his company and influence. This greatly affects the thoughts of the people and the friends often depart from each other as they change. In any friendship, the friends maintain their individuality and their thoughts. They share their thoughts and feeling with their friends and seek their help and assistance in solving their problems.

Love: The Chemical Reaction

Love is an act of the synthesis of soul. People fall in love not because they are similar to each other, but because they are different from each other. Yet the difference is desirable because each partner lack the attribute of the other person. Hence love complements each other in a way that the lovers become one whole entity and become complete. The lovers are lost in each other like milk and water. And a lover says

Within you I lose myself

Without you I find myself

Wanting to be lost again.

Indian philosophers believed that soul is the cause and origin of the body and the mind of all living beings. Hence the body and mind can not know the desire of the soul as they originate from soul and not otherwise. Therefore, the attraction of soul is manifested in the attraction of body and mind of the person. Thus physical attraction is the unavoidable consequence of love that originates from the desire of two souls to become one. In the same way, the mind of the lovers too can not resist the force of attraction. Thus the lovers find every thought of their love extremely desirable and logical. It is the illusion created due to the synthesis of soul. The mind can only speak the language of soul without actually understanding a word of it.

However, once the souls of the lovers become one, the forces of attraction start diminishing. How can you feel attracted to your own self? No one can feel excited and aroused seeing his or her own body. Similarly no one can get impressed by his own thoughts as he already knows those thoughts. In love, both souls lose their identity just like hydrogen and oxygen loses their identity when they combine themselves to create water.

Love is thus like an exothermic chemical reaction wherein tremendous energy is created as all the participating atoms lose their identity and create a new identity called molecule having a distinct physical and chemical property. Yet the energy last forever. It has to diminish once the process of synthesis is completed. Yet few people can forget the energy and the attraction that love created during the process of falling in love.

Thus love causes the forces of attraction between the lovers to diminish which brings peace and tranquility in the life of lovers which is the sign of spiritual evolution of human life. Yet lovers wonder if their love is lost as their feelings have changed after love. They crave to get back their identity, freedom and passion which they have before the union of the soul. Such people get highly disappointed and evolution is always a one-way road. Just like it is impossible to become young again after you have grown old, in the same way it is not possible for a spiritual person to return to the stage of physical and mental level of beings. The result is disappointment and pain as the lovers fail to appreciate the benefits of spiritual life that love brings in their life.

Love is like a chemical reaction that eliminates the identity of the individual atoms by creating a new molecule. Love transform the person from a physical being to an spiritual being.

How to avoid Pain of Love and Friendship?

The pain of love and friendship can be considerable diminished if only one can really understand the physics and chemistry of them. Friendship does help the person in the intellectual growth by sharing of the thoughts and feelings with each other, yet it lasts only so long as the thoughts of the friends do not change. If the friends change, people must welcome new friends who share the same thoughts, believe and values. It is wisely said that “a man is known by the company he keeps”. So beware of your selection of friends as they can gradually change your thoughts by their company.

The pain in love can only be avoided by knowing that love is a spiritual experience of the human beings that needs the partners to lose their identity in each other so as to play the complementary roles rather then same roles. Love transforms ordinary human beings from physical beings to spiritual beings by giving completeness in their life. Love being spiritual can never die while lust being physical in nature can never remain the same. Alicia Barnhart has rightly said

“True love never dies for it is lust that fades away. Love bonds for a lifetime but lust just pushes away.”

Thus the physical attraction between the lovers has to gradually transform into the spiritual unity which makes the lovers part of each other rather than having their distinct identity. It paves the way for the peace, tranquility and happiness in life that is the trademark of a spiritual person. The need is to value love over the sensual pleasure of lust and the dry ocean of logic and reason.

Friendship is important to everyone, but many of us have a hard time building lasting friendships with others. By using the Law of Attraction you may find that building these lasting friendships are easier and that making trustworthy friends happens more and more often.

The first step in building lasting friendships, using the law of attraction, is to work on your own self-confidence. To attract the kinds of friends you want in your life, the kind who will build you up, instead of dragging you down, you have to believe that you deserve those types of friends. With confidence in yourself more and more people will want to seek out your friendship.

The second step in building lasting friendships, using the law of attraction, is to be a good friend to the ones you already have. This means being a good listener when your friends need one. Giving them positive advice and empathy when they are having a hard time is also important. The most important part of this step is empowering those around you with your positive feelings.

The third step in building lasting friendships, using the law of attraction, is to let go of your fears. After gaining self confidence, your fears should already be somewhat less than before, but you must continue to grow. You must learn to release yourself from fears of rejection and fears of abandonment. If you believe you’ll be rejected, then you will be. If you believe you’ll be abandoned, you will be. So instead of holding onto these fears, release them.

The fourth step in building lasting friendships, using the law of attraction, is changing your beliefs about friendship. Ask yourself why you believe you don’t have friends, why some people don’t like you, and what you can expect from your friends. Then, take your answers and replace those old negative beliefs with new positive affirmations. Recite your positive affirmations over and over again, until you believe them.

The fifth step in building lasting friendships, using the law of attraction, is to visualize yourself surrounded by the kinds of friends you want to have. Make sure that you visualize all the details. How do your new friends dress, act, think, talk, and believe? As you visualize these new friends, allow yourself to feel all the good feelings associated with having many friends. Especially focus on those feelings of gratitude associated with having so many friends.

If you follow these five steps to building lasting friendships using the law of attraction, I am sure that you’ll begin to see how many friends you have to be grateful for. Once you’ve gained your confidence and let go of your fears and negative beliefs, beginning new friendships will be easier than ever before. Once you’ve become a better friend yourself more and more interesting and fun people will be drawn to you. Visualizing your successful new relationships with friends will not only make you feel more thankful, but it will draw more friends to you.

Everyone has prejudged people at one time or another in their lives. It is a common occurrence and it goes on day in and day out. Everyone is a product of their environment and more often than not, do not even realize that they themselves do this very thing. I bet I can show you a few observations that you are guilty of and do not even realize that you are one of the people that allow it to happen to themselves.

The first example I want to demonstrate to you is the fact that you think all wealthy people are evil or commit more sins than people who are not wealthy. I want you to think about television and movies in general. I want you to run down the list of all the wealthy people in movies off the top of your head. In movie after movie the person with the money is the evil bad guy with plans to steal the land or take the widow’s ranch. The opposite also holds true when observing the lead character. Spiderman was poor and he was a good guy. Batman was rich and good but he is considered a psychopath. It is always the rich person’s dream to take over the world and enslave everyone else. In the world of the silver screen if there is a wealthy person in the cast, then he is more than likely the evil doer.

Even if you take this concept to the small screen, television, it still works. Even on Gilligan’s Island Mr. Howell was the bad guy out to just make more money. Jed Clampett was wealthy but the good things he did were either portrayed as silly, ignorant or just plain naive. On the Dukes Of Hazard Boss Hoggs was the one with the money and was dumb and evil. Sure you can find exceptions to this “rule” but more often than not, the one with the pile of money is as evil as Lex Luthor on Superman.

Are you sure you do not associate wealthy people with being evil?

Another situation when you prejudge a person is if they do not correctly speak the English language. If you meet a person who speaks English poorly you will judge them even more severely. The judgment I speak of is that all too often when a person speaks broken English and stammers and stutters with his words, the average individual attests this struggle with being stupid. All too often as a person struggles to find the words in English they are considered dumb. One point that most of the “jury” overlooks in the declaration of this verdict is that this person stumbling through the correct connection of verbs and nouns is speaking a second or maybe even a third language. English is considered to be one of the most difficult languages to learn and here is a person attempting to learn it as a second language. Even with this being a second language many will landmark this person as being stupid. This individual who cannot string together nouns correctly in English may be a scientist in their homeland and yet they are judged as “dumb” because their English is broken.

Are you sure you do not prejudge people who are learning a second language?

Another situation is meeting people who are overweight. The heavier a person is the more “skinny” people avoid them. When overweight people are out in the world they receive stares and insults as if they wear an X on their back. Children are savage in this aspect. If there is an overweight person in school they are ridiculed and taunted and even hated by their peers. Living the life of an over weight person is one where the joy is stolen at an early age and it is replaced with missing self esteem. Over weight people are not loved for who they are and more often than not ridiculed and even avoided by those who are not over weight. How many movies have you seen where the beautiful woman had a girlfriend with low self esteem and was overweight?

Rich and evil… immigrant and low IQ… overweight and lazy? Are these assumptions you make on a daily basis and do not realize that you do this? All too often people rush to judge those they do not know. All too often the world is revolving so fast that they are lost in the shuffle of misconception. We should all learn to give other people a chance. So the next time you speak to someone in broken English stop and help them with their struggle of the language barrier. Look them in their eyes and see the person that resides within. The next time you see an over weight person do not look away in disgust. Greet their eyes and smile at them. Look into their face and you may see their soul and that soul may light the spirit of compassion in your heart. Overweight people are just people and they need compassion like everyone else on this planet.

Do not prejudge because that judgment is more than likely wrong.

Let’s talk about me… lets talk about I, me, mine, my… oy vey….

Ashley’s long-time friend was in another tumultuous and toxic relationship. Brenda constantly asked Ashley for advice with no intention of following it.

Ashley realized that their friendship was unhealthy and she had slipped into the role of counselor and therapist rather than friend. Ashley felt resentful, bitter and weary of the constant drama. Something needed to change.

Brenda was so wrapped up in her stuff that she was totally unaware that a problem existed with Ashley.

Energy Vampires

This unflattering term unfortunately fits some of the nicest people in the world. These people rarely mean any harm; it is just the way they are. They are unaware and self-absorbed and will naturally draw others into the drama of their lives.

Some get stuck in their problems

You know someone like this. Cleverly disguised as a dilemma looking for a solution; this person is actually getting an entirely different payoff (attention, validation etc) from their attachment to their problem. They need drama in their lives and might not know how to live in peace times.

Here’s the thing

• ‘Whatever’… about Brenda, (bless her heart), your responsibility is to look after “You”
• You are not responsible for anyone else’s personal growth (even someone you care about)
• You are also not qualified to solve anyone else’s problems (even if you think you are)

Put your emotional hands in your pocket and back away from the drama.

Keep your advice to yourself

It is unhealthy to become invested in the way someone else lives her life. Your solutions will not fit, nor can you create in her reality. Get clear on your healthy boundaries. Know what is yours and what is hers.

You are responsible for what you invite into your vibrational bubble.

Any excessive energy you spend focused someone else’s life, is energy that is not available to focus on attracting what you want in your own. Being a supportive friend feels good. Being taken advantage of whether on purpose or not, doesn’t feel good.

What to do

• Hold the vision of your friend accessing her own wisdom and solving her problems in an empowering way.
• Tell her you believe in her and trust she can grow through this.
• Affirm that you see her on the other side of her problem, wiser and stronger.
• Do what you need to do to protect your positive vibration.
• Set clear, healthy boundaries around each and every relationship that you have.

Ashley and Brenda. Epilogue

The two women are still friends. Ashley decided to allow Brenda to solve her own problems and created healthy boundaries around support. She withdrew completely from offering any advice. She began to change the topic when Brenda hauled out her victim manifesto.

Interestingly, Brenda found someone else to draw into her endless drama. Ashley doesn’t hear from her as much.

If you are a ‘fixer’ by nature, you may want to look at that, bring the focus back to you and your growth.

The proverb, “There are always two sides to every coin.” refers to the fact that there is more than one way to look at everything? From this concept you can create one of the main presuppositions of life; behaviors are not good or bad, rather they’re useful or un-useful in the moment. People sometimes seem to forget that last part.

The fact is that every behavior is useful in the right situation. With the right point of view you can see how something that is limiting in one way can be rewarding in another. A common example of this is the goal of putting no expectations on people in a relationship. It’s very true that it would be nice if we could live free of expectations - however, it doesn’t work that way.

Some sense of predictability creates feelings of understanding, safety and control over one’s life. This includes relationships. We have certain criteria to determine friendship and, whether we want to admit it or not, expectations and criteria go hand-in-hand. The criteria we have to identify a friend are what we expect from them. Some common criteria include things like trust, honesty, compassion, etc.

If we add the awareness that criteria can be ordered in a priority sequence then some things we can allow ourselves to be flexible on and others we can not. If a person dislikes a certain type of music upon meeting them, then setting that as an expectation in the relationship will “pigeonhole” them. That expectation is an un-useful limitation on the friendship because it does not take into account that people’s preferences can grow and change with time. Concepts more important than taste in music, such as trust, we can be less flexible about because if a friend does something to lose our trust in them (such as lie, steal, abandon, hurt, etc.), then the dynamics of the friendship can change drastically.

Even though a person can recognize a behavior may be useful in a different situation - in the immediate circumstances it may be un-useful, resulting in damage to the relationship. Admittedly it’s not so black and white; some behaviors may hurt you, however you’ll accept that it was not done with malice, rather it was unintentional. When a person repeats that behavior in spite of the fact it harms the relationship then there will reach a point where “I’m sorry” becomes insulting.

With all this in mind the questions we want to consider are; Can you allow your expectations of someone to be flexible on the minor issues while still asserting your values on the real important points?; Can we accept that people change while still being careful that those changes don’t go against our own highly valued criteria for friendship?; Is it possible to accept someone for who they are today and expect that things may change tomorrow, while at the same time, know that it’s okay to expect certain core components (such as trust, honesty, etc.) will remain somewhat consistent?

I went home to a family reunion in December. Normally stories of this nature conjure images of either loving parents, aunts, uncles, and siblings, laughing and loving, or the opposite image of squabbling relatives, all wondering why they had traveled such great distances only to spend the holidays in abject misery.

Not so in my case. This was not a typical family reunion, but it was indeed a reunion of a loving family. It is the family of girlfriends! A sisterhood! Although not true sisters in the flesh, my girlfriends and I couldn’t have been any closer had we come out of the same womb.

We spent the night in a beautiful home, festively decorated, with tree lights twinkling, listening to Christmas carols on CDs, consuming wonderful food, imbibing our favorite drinks, exchanging gifts, and talking rapid-fire, relating what has happened to us since last we were all together, and taking group photos to be gazed upon lovingly in the coming years. Here we were, eight women with one voice, one heart, one mind. We are all each other.

Some of us have been friends since kindergarten. Some came along later. But all of us have remained loyal and steadfast, and we share a deep and abiding love and respect for one another.

Every year at Christmas we gather together at one or the other’s house to celebrate our enduring friendship and to give thanks for all that we’ve shared over the years, although most of these gatherings have fallen to just one of us, but she is the Hostess with the Mostess, so we naturally gravitate to her home.

This past Christmas was the 50th such reunion for The Girls as we always refer to ourselves. In our minds, we are still The Girls, no matter how many wrinkles or sagging jawlines, or droopy eyelids appear to try to disabuse us of that notion.

Of course we’re still The Girls. We’re just The Mature Girls now. Mature to all outward appearances, but still The Girls on the inside, in our minds and hearts where it really matters.

Having moved away from home many years ago, I have missed attending a lot of these reunions. But my sisters always made sure that I was a part of the festivities, calling me from the party and passing the phone from one to another so that I may share in the joy and happiness that we have experienced every Christmas for these past 50 Christmases.

The Girls know my secrets and I know theirs. Although all of us married, some to wonderful husbands, others to not so wonderful husbands, we always had each other with which to share our most intimate thoughts and fears.

We’ve experienced Life in all its glory and all its misery. We’ve raised families, suffered through divorces and even death. We’ve watched our children marry and have children of their own, and no matter how joyous the occasion or how profoundly sad, we have always been there for each other, congratulating each other on those most auspicious occasions or buttressing each other up during the sad ones.

Two of us have suffered the ultimate loss; the death of our child. It’s been 10 years since this first profound loss of a child and this Christmas, 2007, will be the 5th anniversary of the death of my beloved youngest son. We know joy, but we also know great heartbreak.

We’ve each felt a personal loss when one of our parents died, for we all knew each others’ parents and loved them as our own. We offered our support and understanding as each one of us became the parent of our parents.

During our growing up years, we were loved and nurtured by our parents. We each had a mother and father living in the same home. No divorces among the group’s parents. How fortunate we were to have that, and how fortunate we were to be cradled and coddled.

Then one day we found ourselves on the other side of the bank, across the river of life. We went from being taken care of, to being the caretakers, caring not only for our children but also for our aging parents. The caretaking years are rapidly coming to an end now, with the passing of a parent it seems with each passing year, and the maturing of our own children who no longer need us as they once did.

Only two of us now have parents who are living and one of the parents, although technically alive, cannot really be called living. This parent is in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s, robbing him of the joy of his daughter, grandchildren and great grandchildren. He lives in a twilight world now where only he knows what goes on in his once great mind. Of the other two remaining parents, one also suffers from Alzheimer’s but has many moments of lucidity, while his wife is still active and alert and as bright as ever.

Not so for the rest of our parents who have sadly slipped away over the years, my wonderful dad being the most recent one to leave us, September, 2007, two weeks shy of his 88th birthday.

My sisters and I have shared many joys and times of incredible happiness throughout the years. We’ve been there for each other, patting each other on the back for our accomplishments and opening our hearts and our arms wide for a comforting hug during the times of loss.

No matter where we may all live, scattered throughout the country, we are always there for each other. Our door is always open, sometimes decorated with a big Christmas wreath, but always, always open for us to enter and reminisce and share the joy of over 50 Christmases past and close to 55 years of remarkable friendship, with the hope of many, many more years to come.