I have decided that we have two sets of friends in our life: friends for life and friends for life. Confusing, huh? But really, not.
We have friends for life. These are people that we meet along the road of our lives and we just click. We can tell at once that these people will be in our lives for years and years. We feel comfortable with these people and we could easily talk with them into the wee hours of the morning and still not have said it all. We could see them 20 years later and it feels like we saw them 20 minutes ago.
We all have friends throughout our lives that make going through life a lot easier. For instance, you make friends with the people you work with. You have to. You spend more waking hours with those people than anyone else. It would be, and is, miserable to work somewhere that you don’t have any friends. You can even let those people spill over into your personal life.
There are friends from church, your neighbors, etc. These people are there to help get you through what life throws your way. These friends of mine have been with me in the day to day disasters and triumphs I have had in my life. I would love to call them each by name but I know I would miss at least one and maybe a lot more. The funny thing is that these friends know who they are. They are my support system, my personal doctor, nurse, teachers. Their children are my children and vice versa. I couldn’t get through most days without them.
But today I want to concentrate on my friends for life. I have been blessed with at least three of these friends, but I’m sure there are many more. Two of them I met for the first time my freshman year of high school. The other I met my freshman year of college. These friends are not a part of a pack. They know each other but they are not friends of each other. The only thing they really have in common is me.
Beth is right behind me but the other two women are those who helped form me into becoming the woman I am: Kathleen Corrigan Dalglish (Corrigan for short) and Sr. Lynn Jarrell (formerly Sister Ann Margaret)
I met Beth when we were assigned the same home room when we started at Sacred Heart Academy. I don’t know what attracted us to each other, maybe it was only the seating chart. We each had other people we knew in that classroom, but we became friends. I definitely do not know whose idea it was to join the Debate Team but we did and those people became my people. There are times that I ache to see some of those people or interact with them again. I didn’t keep up with most of them through the years, but Beth did, and that has enabled me to bring some of them back into my life. These are my peeps. They know me as I truly am. I can remember being described as “carefree” back then. It was our debate coach who made that observation (I guess because I didn’t stress out like everybody else). But she added, “I hope you are always like that.” I’m not sure I have lived up to that.
But back to Beth. She has been a part of my life since I was 14. I have known through the years that if I needed her, she would be there. I like to tell people that I am the mother of her children. They always look at me weird. But Beth has been just as instrumental in raising my children as anyone else in their lives, including me and their dad. She loves them unconditionally and will not let them slide on the important stuff life school and their faith. If my soul needs a boost she is usually the one I go to. If I’m lucky enough to die before her I know that she’ll be at my deathbed, as I will hers. It’s just the way it is.
Mary Ann is on the right in the back. Jimmy is on the left in the front row.
I met Mary Ann when we went to the American Red Cross Youth Leadership Center at Camp Crescendo in Lebanon Junction, Kentucky. We were in the same dorm room. She was such a flirt and I was socially retarded. I blamed it on the fact that I went to an all-girl school, but that wasn’t it. I was stupid around boys. Mary Ann had them flocking to her. if I mentioned at night that there was a cute guy, the next day he was all over her. It would make me so mad. But we still laugh about it today. Of course, she still teases me that she always took the boys away from me. I tease her right back and tell her that was why I married her brother, she couldn’t take him away from me.
Yes, I did marry her brother. But it was her fault. It was her idea that I move to western Kentucky. She knew that I was in a dark spot in my life and she knew that I was drowning. She threw me a life saver and that’s what happened. She saved my life, from me. I was on a path of destruction and despair and western Kentucky pulled me out. Four years later I married her brother.
Today we are in-laws so our relationship has changed. But every once in awhile we turn into friends again and my heart bounces. She truly has been there for me in my darkest times and led me back to who I truly am.
When I went away to college I was like a fish out of water. I had been so sheltered, which I loved, by the way. But moving to the college town of Bowling Green, Kentucky did quite a few things to me. It forced me to be responsible and it threw me into quite a different social scene that I was not in the least prepared for. Oh, I had heard stories, but some of the things I was experiencing I had never experienced before. Of course , that would be where my friend Lyn comes into the picture. Lyn lived across the hall from me in Potter Hall. She lived with her cousin. I didn’t know my roommate when I moved into Western, but we got along fine. She reminded me of my older sister and as long as I did what she wanted me to, we got along great. She scheduled her classes so that she could go home Thursday night and from that point on I could do what I wanted. That’s when Lyn took over my social life.
Yes, this is Lyn way back when. She was so cool.
Lyn was an Air Force brat. She was proud of that fact. In fact, she still is. She had moved to Bowling Green from Weisbaden, West Germany where her dad was stationed and her family lived. Lyn was wild. Her cousin was not. They got along as family but the cousin did not approve of Lyn. Lyn didn’t care. I thought Lyn was one of the coolest girls I could ever know.
Lyn was shorter than me (which says a lot) but she wore these heels that had to give her 3 more inches, at least. She had the best personality. And she had no fear. I was always doubtful and scared of my own shadow. I knew I was going to get in trouble. Who would have known? Lyn was never afraid that she would get in trouble.
Lyn has come back into my life three or four times but every time we are together it is like we just saw each other yesterday. She’s one of those people that if you need anything she is right there, whether you call her or not. She just knows when you need her.
In finishing this up I have come to realize that I have trusted these women with not only my life but that of those I hold most dear. Beth is their other mother, Mary Ann was entrusted with their care while I worked and is probably the best potty-trainer I’ve ever known, and Lyn took them in at spring break when they started going south and let them be their own people. So, it hasn’t just been me that they have impacted. I truly have been blessed with them in my life. And blessed also for the others who come, serve their purpose and then go along . . .