Stone Solid Friendships

Just like people in the city, there are a lot of stones on the beach. Some look similar. Others you might not even notice. There's rough ones and the ones that are ultra unique or odd shaped and then there are the ones you're drawn to and just have to pick up and keep. Usually, they're smooth. The kind you need to try and see how many times you can skip. You take them home from your vacation or your short day tripping beachcombing and place them in a spot that you look at every once in a while when you're feeling a little wistful to remind you of how you felt at the beach where you found them. When you think about it, it's a lot like how you feel about your good friends.

My friends Anne and Bob are two of the smooth stones. I don't see them very much anymore but they're there and I know they're there and I'm sure they would be there if I really needed them.

I met Anne at the UBC Faculty of Education in the late 1980s. Whenever I visit I marvel at what incredible hosts they are and how much I am spoiled by their servitude. It becomes a running joke. "No, don't get up. Your our guest. We are here to serve you."  It gets a bit ridiculous. So this is what it feels like to be famous when you're not I think to myself. Do you realize that so many people in the world NEVER get such treatment.  I have always thought of them as "surrogate parents". In fact, I am lucky because I have more than a few couples in my life who treat me in a similar fashion and I always wonder what I did to deserve such a blessing.

Anne and Bob have moved quite a bit. Maybe even more than I have but I'm not sure about that. Sometimes they build a new house. Sometimes they buy an old house and fix it up. Sometimes they buy a condo. Their digs are always super nice with the highest quality finishings and I always enjoy seeing how the furniture fits into the latest residence whether it be a beach house near Pender Harbour, a farmhouse in Robert's Creek, a condo overlooking False Creek or their newest place just outside of Sechelt.

 

This is Anne with Charlie, the Heinz 57 master who undoubtedly requires even more attention than I do. 

This is the guest bedroom which is actually a full floor with ensuite and a living room area outside the door with a big screen TV and couches and thick rugs and nice paintings. Believe me, when you go from my humble abode to this bedroom, it feels a bit like you've become a contestant on that show America's Extreme Home Makeover. They're lucky they can pry me out at the end of the visit.

We went for a walk at Smuggler's Cove on a beautiful end of summer day.

Bob with the dogs, Buddy and Charlie.

 

 I liked the way the leaves looked beside the dock.

This is Smuggler's Cove

We took a break to inhale the view with their friend Patricia.

Afterwards, we went to a pub in Halfmoon Bay with a fantastic deck where we ordered Blue cheese burgers.   It's a rare event to get four people at a table all of whom are blue cheese lovers. Then, we took a stroll across a walking bridge to John Henry's Marina store where I had the biggest one scoop ice cream (with three scoops) that I have ever had. Not sure who taught them math (which is worse than mine) but  it's to their customers' advantage. Sorry no pic.

Before I popped over to Sechelt, I split up the ferry trips with a drop into Vancouver. 

Here are a few other stones on the beach that are keepers.

This photo just makes me LOL. I have no idea what THEY were laughing about.

They're pictured here seated at the bench that honours Peggy's Aunt Mary. It's at Third Beach in Stanley Park. 

We had to kick a couple of cute guys over to the next bench so we could sit on Mary's. The guy from Honduras was alot of fun when we explained why we needed to sit on this specific bench. He was fascinated with the story and had pretty decent sense of humour, especially when he found out how much it costs to purchase a bench in perpetuity in Stanley Park. It's more than a Honduran family makes in a year or 3!

Not so bad for two 50-year-old chics.

Best Supporting Actresses...

 Vancouver friends Colleen, Peggy, Dee, Me, Lisa, Heather, Gwen and their Oscar

on the beach celebrating my BIG birthday last weekend at Tigh-na-Mara Spa.

I'd like to thank my mother and my father and my sisters and my brother and my unborn children and my none existent husbands and my former psychiatrist but most of all I'd like to thank my brilliant women friends who have been there for me through thick and thin. Who have made me laugh until my stomach hurt.

You have listened. Been generous beyond belief. Always make me feel like I'm a better person than I really am. Exposed me to things I would have never been exposed to on my own.(ugh):-) It's not like that! Honest!

They've helped me when I needed a hand. Took me places even when I was depressed and no fun just to get me out of the apartment way back.  Brought me into the fold of their own family.  Helped me feel joyous. Brought me back to myself. Refrained from saying, You do realize you're insane right? Who are fun to be around. Bursting with integrity. For endless telephone conversations. For well-placed generosity. And just for being there. You're the best! 

Oh, and most of the time they're not even acting. There is no script. There is no set. Although I can be bossy so sometimes I act like the director. But, like most actresses, they just smile, and go about doing what they were going to do anyway...

Hanging by a thread to my 40s

So, hanging by a thread to my 40s when I turn 49 on Monday and surrounded, last night, by the people who have made it possible for me to enjoy 16 months on Salt Spring.

There was my surrogate mom, Pauline. Her cottage was the venue (of course). She made the fabulous lasagna. She baked and iced the fantastic chocolate Valentine's cake. She cleaned her house and set up the table in spite of everything going on, even a flood as a result of her washing machine malfunctioning. Thank you so much Pauline!What would I do here without her? 

Gail, editor of The Driftwood, who helped make it possible for me to survive in the first couple of months that I arrived by giving me lots of writing work and who has been a good friend with a balanced and humourous perspective on Salt Spring as a 25-year resident with her husband Michael's pithy insights and humour as well.

Karin, who was instrumental in me even thinking I could move here and then pointing me in the direction of the fabulous albeit haunted cottage that was everything I imagined when I thought about the type of place I would want to live in on Salt Spring with its beautiful deck, little wood stove, dark hardwood floors, privacy and its abundant greenery in spring and summer.

Karin has also been an inspiration in how to live your life by your own design and in her commitment to her art even when it's really hard to get by at times. And, once again, a sense of humour that makes bad days better and can instantly throw things in perspective.

Tom and Linda, the first people I met at the Saturday Market who were also newbies there. They made it bearable on those early spring days at the market when you had to get up at 6:30 am to gain your point knowing that you'd be lucky to sell $25. Ouch!  My constant Market neighbours. They've developed into grand friends who spoil me so much that they've even moved one of their couches into their family room to accommodate me while the Olympics are on in case I want to drop by and watch them. And, who feed me, generously, and make fun of me and listen to me providing support and lots of laughs once a week at dinner. (and who helped me move into the place where I live now which, in hindsight, I hope will go down as one of the stupidest decisions I ever made, albeit a necessary one financially). Oh, and who have the kind of relationship that I probably will never find in this lifetime if the past predicts the future.

And we were also graced by Don's presence. An amazing photographer who I know will have a show, perhaps this year, that will blow people away. He shoots photos of neon signs from Vancouver and San Fransisco and I have no doubt that if he ever does show them, they'll fly off the gallery walls. Lucky me, I'm now the proud owner of one of them thanks to his generosity.

So, when I put it that way, there is a lot to be grateful for in spite of how I've been feeling in the past month here. 

Happy Valentine's Day. I can't deny that it gets a bit old to be without a saucy little Valentine to shower with affection but the love in friendships has always proven for me to be more consistent, long-lasting and sweeter in the end.

Bitter Sweet Transitions

Now these people must have a few tricks when it comes to staying in touch. Starting from left to right, she's from Costa Rica but has been residing in Vancouver for the past two years doing a Post Doc at Childrens' Hospital. He's her boyfriend from Spain debating whether to move to Costa Rica to be with her. The other two are from Argentina, both baby doctors too, now residents in Vancouver.
Yesterday I was listening to CBC Radio in the afternoon and they were talking to the writers/poets who had won the 2008 CBC Literary Awards. When Eleanor Wachtel finished interviewing the new winners, she then went back to a former winner, Gail Anderson Dargatz wrote The Girl with the Bell Necklace and that was the beginning of her "real" life as a successful writer which really took off when she wrote The Cure for Death by Lightening.

So, the show ended with a segment where a man was interviewing Gail, asking her questions. One of the questions was "What do you look for in a friend?" Now, most of us might think she'd respond loyalty, kindness, adventure, support, humour, intelligence, but in fact her answer was proximity.

Now, she didn't mean, whoever is close by will do. She did mean that in a world where people are very transient, what she looks for is being able to not be transient and maintain friendships with people who live close-by because that's better than friendships that are pieced together on Twitter, on Facebook, in snippets of time when one or the other happens to be in the same place for a few days or a month.

Why am I telling you this? Because, when I moved to Salt Spring, one of the things I really didn't think much about prior to moving was the fact that I might miss my friends. It seems a bit crazy that I wouldn't have thought of that in more detail because I'd built up a really good circle of friends in Vancouver in the years between 1995 and 2008. They are really important to me. I have a really good time with all of them. I genuinely looked forward to spending time with them and we always have fun, or a laugh, or good conversation and made each other feel better when that mattered. I was just in denial I suppose about how changing places geographically and not being there to continue to do things, in person with them, can't help but affect the friendship. It lessens it no matter how much you don't want that to happen.

I've been thinking about that a lot lately and tonight, I had a conversation with Lisa, one of my bestest friends, someone who has brought me a lot of joy (and vice versa) in the past 6 years and somehow no matter how much we (I) know that life is change and if it isn't, then you're not really living, it's not always easy to go with the transitions away from people that make you really happy. Maybe it's especially more significant when you're single because your friends are your "peeps". You don't come home to one person for support and that's both not a great thing and a great thing if you know what I mean.

Anyway, Lisa and I were talking tonight and it's clear that we're all in transition. I started it by moving. And, even though it's only a few hours from Vancouver, it's a long way when you're not able to consistently hang out with someone to create new memories.

Lisa's having a baby. Her life is about to undergo the biggest transition (next to our own births and deaths) there is. Once the baby comes, it will be very hard for us to maintain a friendship because her life will be consumed by the baby out of necessity and she will then join up with other mothers and that commonality will bond her to them. She was feeling wistful talking about how another good friend of hers was talking about going on a kayak trip to the Queen Charlottes this summer and how in different ways she's feeling kind of wistful, anxious about that separation in possibilities. Because, normally Lisa would go kayaking but not with a baby. Although I guess, technically, it's not impossible. The indians did it. Where's the papoose?

So, there you go. That's what I'm thinking tonight. Life is change. And, it's when you have to let go of the really fun parts to do what you have to do, even when you want to do it, that you can't help but reflect back on the great times you had with those people you were so close to and just hope you can find a way to get back to that place with others in new ways over time and manage to somehow keep a connection with the ones you have had to physically leave.

I'm sure this is nothing new for most people, especially the kind that move around the world, but I've never moved countries or even places within the country hardly at all so it's a revelation.

What are Friends For?

Although I have, and I will thank them individually, I feel the need to just say this for all to read.

I always knew that I had some pretty spectacular people as friends but when it came to my moving it was like, okay, unbelievable! Above and beyond the call of duty. I can't thank Richard and Neil enough for moving me; for actually physically heaving my stuff from the Robson Street apartment, then driving a 1-ton van and not complaining even when they were surprised by the stairs they would have to take my stuff up on Saltspring. Having you two with me on what could have been an incredibly stressful day meant a lot to me. It was unbelievably kind of you to do this for me. Just having you here with me helped me feel calmer about my arrival. Brownie points from the big guy in the sky!

To Beth. Thank you for treating me like royalty when I stayed at "Hotel England" on the night prior to my move. Your attention to every detail to ensure my comfort is a lesson I need to take notice of for when people come to visit me. Loved your robe and the couch was tres comfortable!

To Lisa for throwing me a great party and for having a beautiful sign made that welcomed me to my island life. And, for the day after my moving out of Robson Street when you left your housekey under the mat so that I could come into your house, have a shower, make myself at home and wait for your arrival. Thanks for spending the day with me when I had nothing to do but pass time prior to leaving for Saltspring. Since 2003 when you arrived in my office to introduce yourself at UBC, we've had some pretty damn good times, tons of laughs and I'll miss not having you right here more than you'll ever know. I already miss you!

To Peggy for being so easygoing, supportive and positive and for allowing me to dump a lot of my stuff at your place, even the stuff you certainly wouldn't want but pretended that of course you would! And, for all the fantastic dinners you have cooked for me in the past year or more. I'm not going to say I'll miss hanging out with you and Chris and Catherine because as you said, you're just a ferry ride away. To me, your house is "the family place" and I really enjoy that place because you have the best family I've ever been around.

To Gwen for being so supportive and for being so incredible in showing up to put the finishing touches on the cleaning. I don't know what I would have done without you going the extra mile and showing me how cleaning is REALLY done. Oh, so that's how you do it. Comet! Forget the eco-friendly crap and go with the Comet. It works. Thank you so much for working so hard on my behalf when you've just finished a very stressful time at your "real" job. I don't know what I did to deserve such assistance but I know I couldn't have done it without you and had you not been there that miserable landlady would have really had something to bitch about. (Not that it stopped her). Thanks Gwen.

To Kelly for being so motherly and providing me with a care package for my arrival. I love the book. Can't put it down. And, I did eat the noodles, munched all the cookies within a few days, have put that picture of you and I on my bookcase and made a tuna fish casserole using the tin of tuna you gave me. Thanks for being so great at keeping in touch. I'll miss your stories, your humour and your caring. You and Tom have to come to Saltspring within the year!

To Dee for listening, for the walks around the park and the laughter. When you and I start walking and talking, we laugh. It's inevitable. You must come and visit me. We never did get to Mayne for cycling. So, you must come to Saltspring. I'll miss our impromptu walks and your effervescent enthusiasm and energy.

To Colleen, thank you for being your usual supportive and positive self regardless of what's going on. We've known each other more than 10 years and you never cease to amaze me whether you're taking Cuban salsa, South East Asian classical singing, the Jembe, or learning Mandarin, you've always been an incredible inspiration and as I said on the phone today, I miss you already as well and I'll miss all the "unusual" events you would find for us to partake in.

Keiko. Your painting will find a special place in my new place. Thanks for that. I'll miss our coffee time and your wisdom. It was a pleasure to get to know you much better in the past year and I hope, when I come to town, if I plan ahead you can fit me in. And, since you and George have never been to Saltspring, and it's so artsy, of course you must come (in the Spring)! Lots of watercolour subject matter for sure.

Dave:Beer and conversation. They have a pub here you know. Enough said.

To Paul just for being you. There's something about being around you that always makes me feel better. Thanks for cooking me dinner and buying me dinners. I like your stories. I aspire to live the life you're now living. International travel at the drop of a hat. Romantic getaways. You've always been a favorite and you must come to Saltspring with you know who!

To Michelle from afar. We've each had a year that's left us a little speechless (if that's ever possible) and your support via the long distance telephone lines and e-mail has been a real comfort to me. We'll get it sorted out sooner or later. I'm sure of it.

To Anne. We don't see each other much anymore but I know you're always there. I'm sending you positive wishes. Keep the faith!

Hazel. You make me laugh. You just might be the sweetest person I've ever met and, as I said, anyone who has a sick child would be blessed to have you as their doctor. Those chocolates you gave me are SO good. I've almost devoured the entire bag. You make running look effortless and you were the second best thing about joining The Running Room. The first? The fact that I joined The Running Room at all! What's wrong with this picture?

To Murray for proving it's possible to meet a nice, kind, relatively sane man out of the blue on the street. Thanks for your kindness, the too cute camper charm you gave me at the party, and for generously making me feel better when things didn't turn out as expected that day on Saltspring. You really helped put it all in perspective and once again, your generosity was above and beyond.

I hope I haven't missed anyone but this past year has been unusual and unpredictable but interesting in its own right and I am so grateful to every one of my friends for keeping the faith (not to mention picking up the tab) more times than I can remember.

Each of you has set the bar way too high for the friendships I'm sure to make in the future. Bless you all with love and gratitude! Onward!