Friendships come and go, don’t they? And sometimes they come, and go, and come again. That’s the way it was with my friend Jeannie. We were fast friends, we drifted apart, we reconnected after many years, and became better friends than ever.
Jeannie and I met in high school, in Biology class, I believe. We started hanging around. All of our respective friends had boyfriends, and we didn’t. We were both miserable about that. So we were miserable together. On Friday nights. And Saturdays too, actually. It’s amazing, you know, how many laughs you can have while you’re being miserable with someone else.
When we each acquired boyfriends, our friendship persisted. I guess it was based on more than shared misery after all. When her boyfriend left town, I made my boyfriend go and pick her up so she wouldn’t be alone on Friday nights. I can’t remember what he thought of that. I probably didn’t give him a choice. I didn’t want her to be miserable at home alone.
We started at U.N.B. together. Then she left university for the world of work, and I carried on at school. Later, I moved to Ottawa, she to Vancouver and eventually to Ottawa too. Then we drifted apart. I was busy trying to survive my first years of teaching. I met Hubby. She got married and moved to Montreal, and then to all kinds of places all over Canada with her husband’s job. They had a child, a baby girl named Maggie, who I met once when she was a toddler and her parents were in Ottawa for a few days. Jeannie and I had tea together that time. And we had lunch once in the nineties when she and her family lived a couple of hours drive from Ottawa. Then we lost track of each other.
And so it goes. The years fly by. And suddenly we’re sixty-two, and we haven’t seen each other in years and years. Until 2018 when we reconnected on Facebook. And began what is probably the longest continuous conversation ever on Facebook Messenger.
That’s Jeannie above. In the kitchen at my mum and Lloyd’s house in the mid-seventies. I adored that sweater, and borrowed it whenever I could. She said one day in our FB convo that I was the only friend she trusted to borrow her clothes. She said she knew I looked after my own clothes, and that I’d take good care of hers.
That’s me, above, in the driveway of Jeannie’s parents’ house in downtown Fredericton. It’s 1975, I think, and we were in first year university. Jeannie taught me how to tie that neckerchief I’m wearing so it looked like an ascot. Gosh, I loved their house. Jeannie sent me a link to Canada’s Historical Places once. Her parents’ house, built in 1903, is listed there. It’s Queen Anne Revival style, apparently.
I always thought her family was rich. Coming from a working-class background and living on the farm where my step-father went to work in what we called “work clothes,” meaning a hard-wearing shirt and pants that mum could throw in the wash when they got dirty, which they did, I thought that fathers, like hers, who went to work in a suit and tie were intimidating. And that people who lived in big houses in town were rich.
It’s funny how we can get things so wrong when we’re kids. Jeannie’s dad grew up on a farm which Jeannie’s older brother still runs. Her uncles were fishing guides on the Miramichi River. Not so different from my family. But I didn’t know that back then.
In one recent FB thread she teased me about meeting her uncle Bill when we were seventeen. Apparently we were in her parents’ kitchen ironing our jeans for our Friday night adventures, and her uncle, her mother’s youngest brother, came in. He was tall and tanned, and very good looking, very much the rugged outdoorsman. Jeannie said I could hardly press a straight crease in my jeans I was so “smitten.” That’s her word, not mine.
You know, I can’t explain what that ongoing, freewheeling, utterly shallow at times, quite philosophical at other times, but always totally honest FB Messenger conversation that Jeannie and I have been having since 2018 has meant to me. We have talked fashion, and books, and told old New Brunswick stories. We’ve shared painful revelations, and cheered each others’ triumphs, and tried, not always successfully, to assuage each other’s fears.
We reminisced, talked clothes endlessly, and on-line shopped together. Especially during lockdowns. I told her about Hubby’s and my travels, and shared worries about Mum’s growing frailty. She told me stories about her father’s prize homegrown potatoes, about her daughter’s year studying abroad, and about her own ongoing and increasingly difficult health issues.
We began to know each other in ways we’d never known each other before. If she had a sleepless night due to chronic pain, she might jump online and send me links to what was in her “shopping cart.” Or talk about the new calves on her brother’s farm. Or share a favourite book. I never knew she was a Mitford fan, and she never knew I was either.
She wrote long, beautifully composed stories, not mere messages. She said I must be growing tired of her “essays.” I said I loved her essays, to keep them coming.
We discovered that we’d each developed an abiding love for Max Mara coats. When we knew each other back in the day, neither of us could have afforded Max Mara anything. I’d forgotten that we had the same taste in clothes. She recalled a night back in the seventies. We were in her bedroom getting ready to go out and talking about what we loved and despised with respect to fashion. “Do you remember when we decided that we would always dress with “Understated elegance?” she asked me. Oh my. Understated elegance, I’d forgotten that.
Do you remember when we decided that we would always dress with “Understated elegance?”
I treasured the fact that she read my blog. Every post. And she jumped into the conversation, especially if it was about a fashion dilemma. Like the one where I ordered two dresses on-line and loved them both when they arrived. How could I decide which to keep and which to send back? I ended up keeping both, and she even ordered one for herself. Ha.
Jeannie commenting on my dress dilemma, in It’s Raining Winter Dresses: “Oh dear. We haven’t been able to shop together in person for years but here we go. I wouldn’t think too much about both dresses being grey because they are very different shades aren’t they? I do love the lighter grey with your hair but I’m not able to wear that shade and am better in a charcoal grey. The second, longer dress I had thought about before and seeing it on you it looks much better than I had previously imagined. So now I’m thinking about the first one in the other available colour. Your legs do look fabulous too, you hot babe!”
My reply: “Ha. And here I thought my “hot babe” years were over. Not that they ever began. I was surprised a bit by both dresses. They would both look great on you, Jeannie. You have the height to carry that long one off. Now, I’m imagining a big shopping trip we go on together when all this covid stuff has passed. 🙂 I can’t think of anyone (except Liz) whose opinion of what looks good and what doesn’t I would trust more than yours. You always had an eye.”
We tried over the past few years to make that imagined big shopping trip come true. Or if not a shopping trip, then a sitting curled up on the sofa, sipping tea, and chatting trip. But it never came to pass.
And then she died. On Tuesday to be exact.
And I have been bereft for days, my head full of thoughts of missed opportunities, and regrets for what might have been. They had finally moved closer to Ottawa, only an hour from Manotick, door to door. But by then it was too late for visits.
The funeral was yesterday.
Hubby and I drove to the small city where they’d moved so very recently. It was sad and, in many ways, quite comforting. I met Jeannie’s daughter, Maggie, as a grown-up. Saw her husband again for the first time since the eighties. And hugged her niece, Jeannie’s older sister’s daughter, whom I knew when she was a child. She is the spitting image of her aunt, stylishly dressed with a dark brown bob and red lipstick. The eulogy delivered by father and daughter was moving and filled in so many blanks for me. After all, I’d not seen my friend on a regular basis since we were both single.
I was glad that we had come. We were welcomed so warmly, hugs and tears all round. A friend from the past. A friend from home.
The photo below is one Jeannie sent me a couple of years ago. I had to search through five years of FB Messages to find it. She sent it to me when we’d been talking about our enduring love of fashion. It shows her baby daughter and her two nieces engrossed in Jeannie’s copy of Vogue.
I hugged two out of three of those girls yesterday and told them about the photo. They remembered it, and we all laughed. I said I’d swear that baby Maggie was saying, “Aren’t those Prada shoes?” She is her mother’s daughter after all.
So that’s why this post is a day late my friends. I know you don’t mind. After all friendship is what this blog is all about in many ways. Friendship and shared interests, whether it’s a love of fashion, or books, or storytelling.
I am so pleased that despite the fact we never got to meet up again in person, Jeannie and I revived our friendship. And built upon it. We still talked about the old passions: clothes, shopping, more clothes. But there were new passions too, ones we’d each held for years and never shared. Until now. And that was the coolest thing of all.
Now before I go, I want to tell you about a plan that a reader, Catherine Bray, and I have come up with. When my friend Debbie and I are in Toronto in the first week of June, we’re going to meet up. And you’re invited, if you’re interested.
We plan to meet in a downtown Toronto pub, in the early evening, on Wednesday June 4.
So if you’ll be in the neighbourhood and can join us, let me know in the comments. I’ll remind everyone and give the time and the venue address next Saturday. It’s right downtown, within easy access of public transit.
I hope a few of you can make it. We’ll have a drink and share a story or two. And we’ll toast friendship.
And maybe raise a glass to my old friend Jeannie.
78 thoughts on “Friendships Come and Go and Come Again”
dimensions of friendship…. so beautifully expressed.
Sending condolences and appreciation for the love which binds us all.
Thanks, Lorelie.
So sorry for the loss of your dear friend. What a wonderful tribute to friendship. Also Kudos to FB for the good things it can do in helping us to connect and reconnect. I wish I lived close enough to join the meet up. I will be there in my heart.
Thanks, Mary. Wish you could join us too.
As I read this post it slowly started dawning on me what the ending might be, then there it was. Sincere condolences on your loss Sue. It’s such a shame that you and Jeannie didn’t meet up again in later life, but you have your rich friendship there online, something that I’m sure you treasure even more now.
Thanks, Patricia. I do treasure what we had.
Jeannie sounds a lovely woman & you were fortunate to have her in your life . Not everyone finds a friend like that . I met my oldest friend , now a widow , when we were seventeen . Max was best man at her wedding & we’ve been in touch ever since . Not so much when her children were small & her life was very different to mine but we came back together as the children did their own thing . We aren’t even very alike , she’s quite sporty & can’t understand my love of fashion – she doesn’t even wear make up & laughs when I put my lipstick on . But that’s the thing , we laugh . We have the same sense of the ridiculous & leave each other quite exhausted with laughter at times . She lives about twenty miles away , which is good as we can meet up for lunch every month ( & show ourselves up in restaurants ) We can talk about family members , including those long gone & most importantly we know each other’s faults – & yet still the friendship continues. So I can imagine how you are feeling now & I really sympathise . I love the meet up idea & only wish I could join you – hope there are lots of photos .
I’m so,so sorry Sue. Having such a wonderful friend…..
We are often thinking how everything will be the same….but it is not,sadly
Love,
Dottoressa
Thanks, Dottoressa. No… nothing stays the same… you’re right.
There are so many way to find things in common aren’t there, Wendy? And sometimes it isn’t immediately obvious. I love that your friend laughs when you put on your lipstick. On a girls’ road trip once the friend who I loved and who was sharing a room with me marvelled at all the paraphernalia I’d packed, creams and makeup. She’d packed her toothbrush and some body lotion, but she said she wanted to watch me get ready because she was fascinated with what all “that stuff” was for. Ha.
I too began to realise, with tense changes, what was going to come next. You have all my heartfelt sympathies at the loss of your dear friend, pal of your youth, sharer of tribulations and joys. Rest your heart. And, oh! If only Toronto were nearer! The pathos, as Northey would have said. But have a wonderful time and I look forward to seeing photos of all the fun.
Thanks, Annie. That comment about the verb tense made me smile. Ever the English teacher. 🙂
Oh what a heartbreaking loss. I am so sorry to hear of this. She sounds like a lovely friend and how sad for her family to lose her so early. I can understand a little bit the shock of the loss, especially relatively young.
By chance I’m going to be in Toronto soon but on the 7th. Perhaps you are also planning to take in the Tissot’s women exhibition at the AGO? Hope you have fun in any case and enjoy a fine shopping outing too.
Thanks, Stephanie. Wish you could join us.
thank you so much for this article. i admit i cried a little for your friend and for my own friends i have lost along the way. there is something very special about the friends we form in our teenage years. emotions are so heightened at that time and we cling so tightly to our friends, in a way we perhaps dont later in life. i wish i could join you for your meet up which sounds like a blast. however i am coming to the end of two months in the UK without my husband (visiting my family and old friends) so i think he might object if I say i am off to canada for an evening out! maybe next time?
Maybe you could stop on your way home??
A beautiful piece Sue and a wonderful tribute to your friend Jeannie. It really touched my heart and reminded me of my own friendships which have come and gone over the years. Time is fleeting and good friends are precious and worth nurturing, as you did with your friend Jeannie.
After reading your blog today, I listened to Sandy Denny, an English folk singer and writer, singing “Who Knows Where the Time Goes”, which she wrote in the late 60s. This song portrays love and loss so sweetly and gave me a nudge to get in touch with friends I haven’t seen for some time.
Time is fleeting indeed. 🙂
Sad and beautiful post all at the same time. hugs..
Thanks, Lise.
Oh this resonated so deeply with me. I had a friend, not a close friend, but she was part of my life as a young mother. As the years went by we saw each other less often though we always sent Christmas Cards and saw each other occasionally. And then Covid and we didn’t see each other at all, and after Covid I was always going to, you know, because she was just part of the furniture of my life. And then I heard she’d died and I was devastated. Her funeral was lovely, as it was a Quaker funeral, but what a lesson to learn – connection is everything.
So sorry for your loss – beautiful heartfelt writing – thank you.
Oddly enough, Covid brought Jeannie and I closer. 🙂
As others have said, beautifully written. Thankfully i had tissues handy.
I’m off to reconnect with an old friend. 😔 😘
Thanks, Fiona. 🙂
I am so very sorry on so many levels for your loss. The ebb and flow of life certainly moves friends in and out of your circle. I have lost so many people due to my shifting focus on children, work and maintaining a career for 40 plus years. Now you sit and ponder how things got away from you. Sad.
I wish I could join everyone for a drink. However it is not possible given time, location. So, please tilt one for me and I’ll be here on my couch doing the same.
Thanks, Kat. Too bad you can’t join us. Maybe another time.
Beautiful tribute Susan. I can imagine the service was very sad. I admire you for going and sharing memories with Jeanies family.You have been a true friend for so many of us,sending hugs ❤️
It was sad. Rob and Maggie’s eulogies were moving. And it was lovely to hear of Jeannie during that long period when she was not a part of my life. As I said to her in our FB conversation, sometimes I think old friends need to introduce ourselves to each other.
Remember that night back in 2006 when we reconnected after so many years? xox
What a deeply bittersweet post. Those friendships are pure gold, aren’t they? It’s so amazing how women of our generation have re-bonded with childhood friends and seen those friendships grow and deepen along with us. Heartbreaking too, as we reach the ages when our friends pass on and we are holding the rich memories in our hearts. Thanks for writing this post. I treasure my high school girlfriends too and our group texts have been a lifeline as we navigate these years.
Old, old friends are getting more and more thin on the ground. We need to appreciate them.
Sue, I am so sorry for your loss. This is a lovely tribute to your lasting friendship with Jeannie. I also shed a few tears. I think when we’re younger, we assume we will always have friends in our lives. Now, one dear friend has died, one has health issues and lives hours away, and another is still working and has a full schedule. Since retirement last year, I find myself in need of friends, and looking for that connection that can take time to establish.
Your Toronto meet-up sounds like such fun! My mother is from that area, but I have never been and live on the west coast. I hope you have a great time!
Thanks, Julia. 🙂
Oh, Sue. What a wonderful and yet heart rending story. So sorry for the loss of your friend. 😢
Thanks, Laurel. 🙂
Hello Sue. I am sorry for your loss. But think of how much your friendship brought to her earlier in your lives, but even more importantly, during these last years,
Especially in the past few years, I think. 🙂
Sue,
I am very sorry for your loss. Thank you for sharing the story of your friendship with Jeannie.
Thanks, Laurie.
How sad. Missed opportunities are the worst. I think of my sister, two hours away, my other sister six hours further, a friend who’s eight hours away, and family a plane flight west. We always go to people’s funerals, no matter how far, but we don’t make the daily trips while they’re alive. I need to do this!
Get on the road, Bette, asap. 🙂
Oh, how I wish I could meet up with you in June but I am in Chicago. I will have you in my thoughts.
Enjoy…..
Mary Voegeli
Thanks, Mary.
So sorry for your heartbreaking loss after reconnecting. ‘They’ say hang onto the great memories, and yes, that helps but the loss is still painful. Thanks for sharing your lovely history.
It was wonderfully cathartic to write. 🙂
I’m very sorry to hear about Jeannie. Connections with friends who have known us since our youth are precious, and it’s a loss on many levels not to have her anymore. My condolences.
I hope the Toronto meet-up goes well and will look forward to hearing about it! I live close enough to consider joining in if I were not going to be out of province on the date that you’re meeting.
Too bad, Denise. Next time, perhaps.
Sue, I am so sorry for the loss of your good friend. I loved the story of your friendship and thought how wonderful it was that you reconnected through Facebook Messenger. It’s lovely to have people in our life who we’ve known for many years and with whom we have so much in common. I know that you’ll treasure your memories.
I will, Sue, thanks.
Sue,
I am so very sorry for the loss of your long time friend, Jeannie. My thoughts and prayers are with you.
I love Mitford also.
Rose
Thanks, Rose.
Oh Sue, what a lovely walk down memory lane. I, too, have lost a very dear friend, and another bestie has been made captive to dementia. The death of a good friendship is painful too. At 84 years old, I am in need of friends to enjoy these times with. I know they cannot fill the void, but new friends are good also
So sorry I won’t be able to join you in June, but I am a little too far down the east coast (in Maryland) to make the trip. Sounds like so much fun. I will be with you in my heart and mind. Enjoy!
Love your blog and await and enjoy each one (no pressure). Claire
Thanks Claire.
Hugs. 🤗
Thanks for the hugs, Linda.
So sorry to read about the loss of your long time friend. Friends like that really help you remember who you are at your core. Your post is a good reminder for me to reach out to a few old friends.
Looking forward to meeting you and others June 4 in Toronto!
I think we will be a small group, Catherine. Nevertheless, I’m looking forward to it too.
I’m so sorry to hear about your friend, Sue. What a wonderful tribute to her. I had a good friend in high school, and we kept in touch for a while after we spread our wings to go out into the world. We had been close at one time, and my daughters were even her flower girls when they were little. Then we lost touch for many years, but we also reconnected on FB. A couple of years ago we happened to be in Mexico at the same time – just 20 minutes from each other. We decided to get together for lunch and it was as if no time had passed. We have made a conscious effort to stay reconnected and actually went on holiday together this past February for three weeks. It is wonderful to reconnect, Sue. It’s also wonderful to keep connected to the new friends we make along the way.
You’re right, Sue, it’s also wonderful to stay connected to more recent friends.
Sincere condolences 🌷
Sue – so sorry to hear about the loss of your deal friend from school and just when you were both trying to reconnect. Similar thing has happened to me. Four nursing friends and Theatre every month and then Covid shut that connection down and now we are all scattered about and not the Theatre in common any longer because of health issues related to one of my friends. One friend lives closer and we have decided that we can still get together for a lunch when our lives get a bit calmer. Strange how life interferes just when we are making plans.
Life does interfere, you’re right, Shirley. We can’t afford to wait too long.
Thanks, Andi.
Oh, Sue, how you capture the richness of friendship and the passage of time. Beautiful. What a blessing to have Jeannie in your life and in your treasured memories. Thank you for sharing so eloquently. ❤️
Ahhh…I would have loved to meet with you and your reader community! Greetings and a toast from Southern California to all who get to join you! Photos, please!
Thanks, Charlene. We will be a small group. Most of my readers are scattered all over the US and the UK. I have no idea how many live in Toronto.
Sue, I am so sorry to read of the passing of your friend Jeannie. What a lovely tribute to her and to your special friendship.
Sending hugs.
Thanks, Kenzie.
Your friendship with Jeannie was a gift that you have never failed to take the best care of (just like your clothes — and Jeannie’s too apparently). Condolences on your loss but I’m so grateful you have so many great memories to enjoy and that you shared a few of them with all of us.
Wish I could join you June 4 but look forward to seeing you soon.
Sheri
Thanks, Sheri. If you came with us we could go to Holts afterwards. 🙂
Sue, I’m so very sorry you’ve lost such a dear friend. I lost my “Jeanie” two years ago after a long struggle with Parkinson’s, and our story followed a similar arc – losing touch after a time, then reuniting via Facebook, then the long decline of illness. I feel for you, my friend, and while I can’t be in Toronto with you, I will raise a glass to Jeannie on the 4th. Big hugs.
Thanks, Carol. I’m still sorry that we could not connect when we were in Lisbon. Another time, hopefully.
I am so very sorry that you have lost your friend. What wonderful memories you have. I hope that they comfort you in the days ahead.
Thank-you, Beth.
Oh Sue, I have just read your post this morning. So incredibly moving.
I loved your telling of friendship reconnection-the conversations, shallow and deep- and I was so hoping it wasn’t going to lead down this path.
Your post is a beautiful tribute to your friend and a really poignant reminder for me. Sending you hugs
Thanks so much, Genevieve.
This was a beautiful post! I’d love to join this week and give my favourite teacher an in person hug?
I meant next week! Oops.
I will be lovely to see you, Sarah. We’re meeting at the Oxley for drinks. Not exactly sure of the time yet. 🙂
Sue,
You have honored your lifelong friend beautifully with your memories, put into words here. I like to think she can read your post too, from someplace, somewhere not so far away…
You have given me a gentle prompt to reach out to old friends. Thank you! Technology has made this much easier and I need to lean into that more.
Have a wonderful day ahead.
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