So I read a wonderful article the other day on therumpus.net called ‘Transformation and Transcendence: The Power of Female Friendship.’
One word: Brilliant.
Harvard graduate Emily Rapp writes a beautiful story of the power of friendship between women, using her own personal hardship and a small band of women she befriended in Geneva as her primary examples.
This article brought tears to my eyes. (And cheeks, nearby kleenex box, and sweater collar.) (I know, what else is new, right?)
This woman faces a hardship that ranks highest among hardships – the loss of a child. While the entire article is indescribably powerful, the section that really stood out to me was the following:
“my friends have done the following: traveled across states and continents to visit me, called or emailed or been in touch every day, cried with me into chardonnay and tequila and tamales, written me weekly letters, taken me dancing, gotten me horribly drunk, fed me, hugged me, held me, conducted research, built blogs, baked, cooked, knitted, cried, shouted, organized fund raisers for Ronan’s expenses, offered their house for visitors, driven me to appointments, advocated for me, given money to me, reminded me that I was loved, responded to a bullet-pointed email with a bullet-pointed response, said “I wish I could save your baby,” and “I’ll do anything that helps. Anything at all,” agreed to go to a desert island with me after Ronan dies and drink Mai Tais and scream at the stars and cry into the sand and go to tourist nightclubs and act like teenagers. Every time (and this happens so many, many times every day) when I think there’s no way I can survive this, that Ronan’s death will kill everything good and hopeful in me, I’ll get a letter or a text or an email or a feeling and it will buoy me in a way that enables me to take another step forward, to be with my son, to help him die, which is my task.”
This article speaks (screams) volumes about the sheer power of friendship. I think it is something we’ve all forgotten, to some extent.
I cannot claim to have experienced anything akin to this woman’s struggle, but I do know that my best of best friends have carried me through all kinds of pain – making me eat when I couldn’t, playing Harry Potter trivia with me to distract my distraught mind, sitting with me in blanket forts while I cried my eyes out, bitched with me when all I needed was my righteous anger to buoy me, and bought me drinks when there was nothing else to be said.
Our friends are, as Ms. Rapp says, our “Support, salvation, transformation, life.” Without them we would be powerless against the volatility of life’s ups and downs.
So here is where I raise my glass to the powerful soul friendships, anam cara’s of the world.
Don’t ever forget what these individuals do for you, because there are no other people like them to be found.
Heartbreaks & Heartmakes 