The Unbroken Thread…

I find it astonishing that the girl I grew up with at boarding school,

the girl who made life barely bearable during my six years of convent living,

the girl whose arm was continually linked in mine,

vanished,

like my crushed cranberry throw, that faded from dusky pink to a honey smear one summer;

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our vibrant friendship gone,

just as we were about to embark on our Uni. days together.

I had no choice but to move forward into my future without her.

I spent the next 40 some-odd years keeping the unsettling memories of my school at arm’s length…

But all it took was a song,  Je t’aime…moi non plus 🙂 (did we really listen to that in a convent?!)

the smell of sausages frying,

incense burning,

my well used fountain pen,

a lacrosse stick espied in an antique shop,

the cacophony of hounds at bay,

the smell of a horse stable

InTouchStables

to bring my teenage years to life again.

The unbidden effect, despite the passage of time, is that I could pop back into those few long years without missing a beat and effortlessly pick up the threads of my past life.  A very Kate Atkinson-esque theme.

And my bestie?

Well, remarkably I subconsciously sought her out.

I gravitated towards book-lovers,

planned six week meal rotations for my family,

thrived in a writers’ critique group,

engaged in philosophical conversations,

kept quotes and wise sayings scribbled in the backs of notebooks,

and swam effortlessly in a lake of words.

I used the lonely terrain of my childhood,

InTouchBarbedWire

to shape the me inside.

My bestie and I may not have kept in tangible touch,

but just as Hubs and I were planning a visit to London, she commented on one of my blogs,

and I finally recognized the brush of her spirit;

The years melted away,

I was about to come face to face with my only link to the minutiae of my teenage years.

Mauron4

At Thornton, 1969

We met at the Apple Store in London’s Covent Garden…our husbands in attendance…just in case we couldn’t think of anything to say to bridge the 46 year gap.

We needn’t have worried;

Her voice, her habits, her expressions, the way she wore her clothes, her beautiful, silky hair, now white, her smile and serene gaze,

brought back the girl I’d known.

I felt a regret of sorts,

the books we could have shared over the decades,

the recipes, the parenting advice, the letters, the holidays,

the day-to-day happenings both catastrophic and ordinary,

all inextricably interwoven with those six years together that formed the heart of who we were to become.

There’s no going back,

There’s no lamenting.

Instead there’s marveling at the way we searched for each other in strangers’ eyes,

discovering the differences and similarities of our lives apart.

There’s moving forward and realizing the miracle

InTouchMauronMe

In London, 46 years on!

of the unbroken thread still holding us together…

Forever,

my friend!

 

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ElRay

2020-04-30 20:45:06 Reply

How nice and it was a wonderful evening seeing you both re-connecting and I am glad it carries on!

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