Friends and all who venture here.

I notice that Rob has made an entry on his site about the value of friends. At the risk of sounding repetative, I'm going to do the same.

Firstly...thanks to those of you who've taken the time to sign my guest book or leave a comment on one of my posts.

It's amazing how we turn to our friends when things aren't going right, yet tend to be less attentive when all's right with the world.

Recently I had a very sobering experience: I belong to a poetry forum called Kookoomunga Square. It's a warm, friendly place, with quite a few poets whom I've known from other pages. One of the lady poets there contacted me with overtures of friendship. I replied and received an e-mail back. Then, being a slack-arse, I put it aside, meaning to respond within a day or two. I actually still have the draft I started in my mail programme. A week later, I was browsing the KS forum and found a msg saying that she was in intensive care and not doing at all well. Two days later she died. I lost a friend before I had the chance to know her and the world lost a good and caring person. I felt so angry with myself. It gave me a wake up call though. Marie was 8 yrs older than I am and mortality gave me a big slap to remind me that time is passing rapidly.

Last year a dear friend of mine died. I knew her personally from my visits to St.Louis and the place won't be the same without her and her ribauld sense of humour. She is directly responsible for my poetry. Mimi introduced me to a forum where I met others who wrote and that kindled my interest. Poetry became, at first, a catharsis and later a joy. Of all her many friends, she shared her illness with only 2. She spared the rest of us, but we also lost the chance to say goodbye and to let her know how much she meant to us.

Enough of the sad side of friendship. I am blessed by the friends I have. For those of you who adopted me when I joined my beloved Rob: Thank you for your ready acceptance of what must have been, to you, a very <i>odd couple</i>. To those of you I've met since and am also honoured to call my friends too, thank you for wanting to share yourselves with both of us. My online friends, most of whom I've known before I met Rob: Thank you for hanging in there for so long and for showing love, concern and acceptance of our relationship. I know some of you had misgivings, but that quickly changed to support when it was proved we had a good thing going.<g>

<i>Our friends are a measure of who we are</i>. If this is the case, I am 10feet tall! (Don't ask me to convert to metric.)

I know there are a couple of members of my family who will be reading this. I want to thank you too, for taking Rob into your hearts. I guess you're used to me doing the unexpected by now.

During my life I've had very few people I could call friends. I guess, mostly, that was due to the fact that I've always been a loner. I've learned that I need the company of others, inspite of myself. Thanks all for being there.

Vickie.

Posted by Midus at October 21, 2003 09:22 AM