For My Friend, With Love
‘My father died in 1900, that’s a long time ago. I was a little girl, but I see him. As I talk to you, he is with us. He is not in the past. If we bring the past with us, it remains present and clarifies the present. If we forget we have nothing. Everything is obliterated.’ *
My mind has been lost in time past recently. The father of one of my oldest school friends passed away a few weeks back and the ghosts of childhood have been summoned from the misty hills where they had been sleeping. Her wonderful mother passed away thirteen years ago and I am stopped in my tracks as I absorb the poignantly vivid illustration of the inevitable parting with which all of our relationships in this life will conclude.
My friend and I met in the North of England at senior school when we were in our early teens. The bond that formed between us was indelibly fortified by the fact that we both hailed from respective religious traditions, she from the Orthodox Jewish community and me from the Tibetan Buddhist. This imbued our friendship with an unspoken understanding; we were tuned to a wave length that was similar in many respects and I always drew great comfort from our connection during the wildly strange days of the life of a teenage girl.
When I sit in the quiet now, gazing at an ocean which today is more green than blue, I am back at the front door of her house in Manchester, ready for a sleepover or some other such shenanigans. I walk through the front door and although the exact layout of the interior is lost in the foggy ruins of time I see the living room in my mind’s eye; two teenage girls are curled up in front of a movie, probably Top Gun or Dirty Dancing. I hear voices, vital and full of life, her father and older brothers in the background, their conversation floating through from another room.
Later we move into the big kitchen; with its separate Kosher appliances. Her mother, whose kindness and sheer force of personality I always loved, bustles through, intent on making sure that we eat. I smile and look around me with affection. This was a home I was always happy to spend time in and memories of it will never leave me.
We stay up far too late into the night, trading stories, dreams and secrets. All too soon we awake to the brightness of the morning. My friend and I were so lucky, our friendship was a moment out of time in a world far more innocent and carefree than that of today. She had her usual patterns within her Jewish community and I had mine within the Buddhist; our friendship blossomed because of our respective backgrounds not in spite of them.
My friend cared for both of her parents, each of whom suffered from illness before they passed. She has a huge heart and an ability to put the needs of others before herself that I admire deeply. When I sit and think about how both of her parents have now passed from this dream of a life it speaks to me of the unfathomable mysteries of our experience. In my mind it is still yesterday and I hear her parents talking. I look around me and it’s today. They both lived wonderful lives, loved greatly and were loved equally in return. They have departed now, leaving the very essence of their being in the hearts of those who held them dear.
* Mademoiselle, Conversations With Nadia Boulanger by Bruno Monsaingeon
