Last night I went to dinner with my elementary and highschool friends. We have not seen each other in years….at least ten years for most of us…if not more.
Twenty one years ago I moved over an hour north of my KC homeland…and I don’t regret my choice…my husband and I have a beautiful life…but I had no idea what a great gift I had been given as a young girl to have such a tribe of friends.
I have known several of these ladies since I was five. They know everything about me…they know I have a temper…that I am horrible at sports…not the best in the grade department and that I hated PE. They know I am funny…many of them got into trouble because of me…they have seen me with braces and bad hair and all of us learning to drive..I never have to pretend with them because they know it all already.
I feel safe in this group…I always will.
Sitting at that table I knew that they all had questions about what I had been through but none of them wanted to draw that out in the group…they asked me privately…when no one else was listening…because ….they get me.
This isn’t even all of us…there were some missing from our fold tonight….but I am grateful.
Young ladies of today…we didn’t have cell phones…we passed notes…some were intercepted by teachers and taken to the principals office…ask me how I know.🤦🏼♀️ We learned to drive on a busy Kansas City freeway with no cellphones…no Mapquest…no GPS. We drove through bad neighborhoods without a care…and our parents never checked…they all just assumed that no news was good news.
Letter writing and diaries were basically how we unloaded our feelings….
I can tell you that most of my decision making was based on opinions of those you see here…your friends matter.
Contrary to popular belief no one cares how popular you were in highschool. No one cares if you were head cheerleader and no one cares how great you were at sports. Athletic ability goes away quickly and beauty fades even faster…make sure your heart is pretty…because that is truly all that matters.
You do not need a huge posse like me….but we had an upbringing like no other so we needed a large group of us…
Be picky with your friends…pick ones who have your back…who speak up for you in rooms that you are not in, but you are being spoken about. Pick loyalty, pick bravery, pick honesty, pick the girls who tell you that you have spinach in your teeth before going in front of a crowd…pick the girls who want you to succeed…who applaud when you do!!
♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️
Pick the ones who love you when you are unlovely.
The Reluctant Red Nose 