Sixty Weeks to 60: Besties (Part 1)

(8 Weeks)

Early friendships are usually forged as a result of parental relationships or by proximity.  I would guess, aside from siblings (of which I had none growing up) most of our friends before school friends were either neighbors or kids of our parents’ friends. Mine were all the latter, since I lived on a busy street and all the houses that surrounded us were filled with older kids – mostly boys. 

Linda was one of those first friends. Our dad’s both ushered at the 7:30 a.m. mass. She was one of the guests at my 3^rd birthday party. Linda carried on through school all the way until 8^th grade. And is still part of the close-knit group of M.B.S. girls, I continue to be connected with in a group chat now. 

Then there was Amy.  I don’t remember how we became friends, although we must have met in kindergarten. I’m not sure I’d call her a “bestie” per se (assuming that was even a term back then), but I spent most of my time with her. Amy was competitive and bossy.  In 5^th grade, typecasted by our teacher, she played Lucy in our version of A Charlie Brown Christmas.  

Amy transferred to public school after 5^th grade and eventually moved away.  But that’s okay, because I had a lot of friends in my class at M.B.S. and 5^th grade was the year Connie moved to town and showed up in school that September. It was 1975. Connie and I literally invented the title “best friends forever.”

I remember a time towards the end of 8^th grade when I cried about my decision to go to a different high school.  I cried like I was never going to see her again.  Yet we remained close throughout high school and even college.  It was probably after college as other relationships and work began to monopolize our time, that we drifted apart a bit. We never went that long without checking in at least, and I did introduce her to her husband.

Connie is childhood memories of silliness and shenanigans. Hours and hours talking on the phone, the long cord blocking the passage for other members of the household. Saturday afternoons at the mall or walking around Ridgewood. My parents were like her parents and hers like mine. We came of age together in suburbia. Attended high school parties. Visited each other at college. Shared fantasies of moving to South Carolina. She was a bridesmaid at my first wedding and also the only friend of the bride, besides my daughter, who made it to my 2^nd wedding a year into the pandemic. 

Connie was on my softball team when my dad coached.  He put her in the outfield believing of course that no one would hit the ball out there.  I can remember watching it from my spot behind home plate (I was the catcher) on the diamond behind High Mountain Road School. The bat cracked and the ball flew high in the sky over the infield and in Connie’s direction.  I honestly think she closed her eyes and just stuck out her mitt. Miraculously, the ball dropped right in.  My dad would be reminiscing about that catch until the day he died!

Connie and I also played basketball at M.B.S. and won the parochial league championship in 8^th grade!  After 8^th grade though, I continued on the athletic track. Connie did not.  As young adults she was more into stuff like step-aerobic classes which I lacked the coordination for and took up running about that time. I recall one time on social media I suggested that she might like to try running.  She was having none of it.

Then back in the fall she admitted to me that she had started running, had done a few shorter races, and might be up for something more challenging. So, to make a long story short – she and I ran the NYC Half Marathon together on Sunday. She was a charity running for Team For Kids. I of course was raising money for Mercy Home. Full circle. Childhood friends supporting children.

That was my 362nd race and my 54th Half Marathon. Pacing my friend to her first half marathon finish after almost 50 years of friendship definitely made it one of the best and most memorable.

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Please help me support Mercy Home for Boys & Girls with my 60th Birthday Fundraiser.  I will be running the United Airlines NYC Half on March 16th. This will be Half Marathon #54. My goal is to reach Half Marathon #60 before the end of the year. Please help me stay motivated, and make sure the children of Mercy Home are provided the care they need. To learn more about Mercy Home and my why, please visit my fundraising page. Thank you.