Building The Love Shack

On Sunday afternoon I had a lunch date. I arrived early and ordered a tea. My lunch date sent me text, she was stuck in Toronto traffic. Soon after, I watch her walk in.

She was well-groomed and well-dressed. Thin but athletic. Her hair shined and her skin glowed. She was the picture of health and hard to believe she was thirty-two. You would have guessed her to be twenty-five.

Since she was taking me to lunch, I let her take control. She ordered a glass of wine for each of us and requested two gluten-free menus, one for the each of us.

Our lunch conversation was varied from travel to books and the difficulties of dating and politics. We discussed food and health issues, work complications and beauty products.

Our lunch date turned into almost fours hours.

After lunch,we walked to our cars, which happened to be parked near each other and I watch her drive off in her BMW.

My lunch date, was with my daughter. With mother pride, I watched her drive away, and then I thought, When did that happen? When did my baby turn into this astonishing young women?

After that visit, I have been asking that same question, when did that happen about many things?

When did my girlfriends all turn into grandmothers? When did we stopping talking about boys with nice butts to health issues? When did we stop talking about clothes fashions to caring for elderly parents? When did we stop talking about wedding arrangements to retirement plans?

Again, when did this all happen?

I can’t seem to find a time or place that when everything seem to change. I remember teasing my first girlfriend when she became a grama. We were in early forties, and, well somebody had to be first. Better her than me.

I was the first to take care of sick parents and to lose them first. Soon after others started to follow in that department. It seemed like it starting happening fast. Now with many gone and the others caring for their parents, this seems like a normal discussion in our lives.

Soon the grandchildren came. It seems they are having one after another. Every-time we turn around, there is another born.

And the birthdays seem to be coming faster, that would ours. First is was Forty, followed by Fabulous Fifty and now we are at the holy crap we are Fifty-Four and entering our Fifty-Fifth year. I am still the youngest of the 1962 babies, by sixteen days, but now those days count.

I look back at our Thirties and we were all watching our weight. We were all getting married again and had all those dresses to fit into. Now we are watching our weight to keep our joints moving easier, our blood sugars down and our cholesterol levels in check.

We drive each other to doctors appointments, yes those dreaded colonoscopy’s . Then there is the  eye-drops test for glaucoma. Mammograms are followed with lunch dates.

And again, when did this happen?

I remember what doesn’t seems so long ago, when we would be on the phone into late hours of the night talking about men and making plans for the night club on the weekend. Now we are in our pajamas and in bed at the same time we would just be heading to the night club. A late night is followed by dragging your butt the next day.

Two glasses of wine is the limit, no more multiple beers followed by shots.That hang over last for too many day, now.

I can’t pinpoint down when everything started to change. I am not sure when our conversations went in different directions. I am not sure when we stopped changing our hair color to match what was in fashion to start covering the grey.

I remember the High School Graduations, our and our children’s. The same goes for the weddings. I remember the children leaving home and us becoming the Empty-Nesters.

I remember vacations becoming just the friends again. The kids were off with their friends and doing their own thing. And here we were, just like thirty years ago. Just the adults, no kids to care for.

What I don’t remember is when we started waiting for each others doctors test results to come in. I know who had the first test, yes, that would be also me. Again somebody had to be first.

I remember meeting my one best friend, we were ten years old and making Christmas rings out of colored paper to hang in the classroom in the fifth grade. I remember meet the next one over the balcony in my first apartment, when I first moved to Canada.

The next one came into my life on my front door step, when a friend of hers introduced us, for me to lend her a book, when we were in nursing school. Two of my other ones were my employees, yes, I was their boss. Another ones mother introduced me to her, we worked together. And the last one, the baby of the bunch in her thirties, I watched her become a nurse, she also worked underneath me.

I can count back the years, up to forty-five years of friendships. I remember the weddings, the camping trips, the ski trips and the babies being born. But for the life of me…. I can’t remember when all the changes happened…