Girl Friday Special: Old Friends

This week I want you to meet two incredible women. They're not bluegrass players, although I think they could be fans. These are two of my best friends. We've known each other 22 years this August.

College is a funny time. You enter, all freaked out, thrown into this new world of being nearly on your own. And so somehow friends find each other, and something clicks, and you get through those first years of early adulthood together. Twenty years later you're sitting around in somebody's yard, having a beer and watching your kids play together, wondering how time got away so quickly.

We loved our time at Denison. We had great teachers, great epiphanies, great times. One of us loved it so much she's teaching there now in the history department and is enduring the tenuring process.

We decided we're not doing too badly today, either. One manages life as a mother and partner in business and marriage to her entrepreneur husband in one of the largest cities in his native South Africa. Another is living in the same college town where we all met, teaching in the history department, raising a family with her econ prof husband. And then there's me, and you know that story, mostly.

The time we spent together last weekend was precious. Our lives couldn't be more different from one another, yet we can't imagine our lives without each other. There is a bit of bliss and peace dwelling there, in what we started more than 20 years ago in a central Ohio college town.

This tune is a retread for the blog, but I'm sending it out to my fellow Denisonians Debbie and Cathy on this Girl Friday with warm regards and fond affection.

Old Friend

Old friend, you just grow dearer,
the lines grow deeper, the paths grow clearer
I recall your every look,
each of them an open book

And though long miles may separate us
my love for you endures
With warm regard and in fond affection, I am truly yours

Old friend, we've seen so much together,
stormy days and windy weather
And like a cloak against the cold
I wrap myself in friendship's folds

And though long miles may separate us, my love for you endures
With warm regard and in fond affection, I am truly yours

Old friends like warp and woof entwine,
each crossing defining the design
And though in places frayed and worn,
the fabric remains untorn

And though long miles may separate us,
my love for you endures
With warm regard and in fond affection,
I am truly yours