The RemembeRed memoir assignment this week, from Write on Edge, is to write about a memory of ourselves WITH someone else. Word limit, 600 or less. A way to start: His/her name was ______________________ and looking back now, I realize….
I had two sisters when I was growing up. The first, Karen, was born when I was seven and a half. The other I acquired on my first day of ninth grade when I was thirteen . Linda was a new face at school, and when I discovered she had moved to our little Connecticut town from Ohio, I chased after her after class. Breathless, I caught up to her on the stairs and blurted out, “I visit my grandparents in Ohio every summer. I love to eat at Frisch’s Big Boy.” The first of many scintillating conversations. That’s all it took for us to make a connection and become best friends.
All through high school we practically lived at each other’s houses. We threw parties nearly once a month, homemade pizza parties at her house, sloppy joes parties at mine. One time we gave each of our invited guests a puzzle piece which they had to match with another guest to see whom they were paired with for that night. Of course, it was just a ploy so we could get the boys we wanted.
We learned to sew dirndl skirts with one yard of fabric gathered onto an elastic waist (skirts were very short in those days) and had closets full of polished cotton dirndl skirts. When I complained of my frizzy red Orphan-Annie hair, Linda was there to iron it straight for me. We shared our deepest longings and fears and insecurities, our hopes and dreams, our joys and sorrows. We grew from children into women.
A year after we both graduated from the University of Connecticut, we took one last trip together as single women. Linda was to marry in a few weeks and I was to follow six months later. We knew our friendship would remain strong, but we were moving into a new phase of our lives. Things would inevitably be different.
We went to Cape Cod and stayed in a motel in West Yarmouth. We rented bikes and rode around Hyannis Port. We ate lobster until we thought we’d burst. I have several pictures of that trip, all on slides so I can’t hold them in my hand. But I don’t need them to remember that time, for it is indelibly written in my heart. It was a good way to say good-bye to a part of our lives we had cherished.
Linda and me on her wedding day
But the story doesn’t end here. When my sister, Karen, died, Linda was the first person I called. Her words to me still ring in my ears. “Oh, Susan, I am so sorry. I’m coming.”
Recently I told Linda we were planning on renting a cottage on Cape Cod next summer so we can have all our children and grandchildren together. Linda e-mailed back, “We want to crash your party on the Cape!!!! Can we be a part of the family? We’re like sisters, aren’t we?” No, Linda, we’re not like sisters. We are sisters.
Coming East 
This post brought tears to my eyes…as your posts often do. Usually, the tears come from a place of recognition. Friends are family members that have been chosen by your heart. What fun you will all have next summer- so much to look forward to!
Loved your comment “Friends are family members that have been chosen by your heart,” LDC. Great way to say it!
Thanks Susan. I think that comment is mine but who knows…if you see it someplace else then there’s a chance I just think it’s mine. LOL
I think it was for you, Robin. I need to put a name to my comments!
I LOVE to read your family stories, and Linda certainly sounds like family. Beautiful post about someone so dear to you!
Thank you, S of S. I think we like family stories, even if they aren’t our family, because we’re all part of the human family and we can relate on some level.
What a beautiful piece. And I love how you introduced Linda as your second sister that you met when you were 13. Very well written! Sounds like a beautiful friendship! Thanks for sharing.
Thank you, Leah. I’m going to visit Linda in a few weeks.
Lovely post. I wish I’d had a friend I could call a sister, but I’m glad you have. 🙂
I do hope you have some lovely friends, though, even if you haven’t known them practically all your life.
This is so great. It’s sounds like Linda is a wonderful person and a true delight to be around. You both are blessed to have such a strong sisterly-bond. 🙂
Thank you, E.C. She truly is a blessing.
Sweet please!
You must be a Southerner in your heart! I, being a former and forever New Englander, will have to have unsweet.
Loving friendships that last a lifetime are a gift. I crashed a lifetime friend’s family vacation this summer and had a fabulous time getting to know her kids and grandkids. Great post.
Those are the best friends, the ones you can just drop in on and they welcome you with open arms. Thanks, Winsomebella.
I have a friend like that. We are still in touch as well. I love hearing about your memories…I get to know you better. I think if we lived next door to each other we’d sit out on the porch in the evenings sipping tea. 😀
Sweet or unsweet tea, J to E? Yes, I know we would. Glad you have a friend like Linda, too.
It’s all McDonald’s fault. 🙂
LOL! Dunkin’ Donuts has good ice tea, too.
I don’t know how you are doing it, but you keep pulling these place-based memories out of me – are you sure we aren’t related or something?
I was born in Ohio. And even though we moved to CT while I was still in kindergarten, Big Boy is a big part of my memories from those very early years. I cannot tell you if we actually went there, or just drove by a lot – I just remember that little guy with the impossibly plastered hair and the silly checkered pants. I was four or five so it’s very likely that I had some kind of strange preschooler crush on the fellow.
As always, thank you for a lovely trip back to the things I hadn’t known I’d forgotten.
I love it, Amy, that we share so many memories. I remember my favorite thing to eat at Frisch’s was their patty melt, a hamburger with melted cheese and grilled onions on toasted rye. Yum! I’m making myself hungry!
Friends like that are truly a blessing from God. I’m glad you have one like Linda, Ms. Susan! I can just imagine the two of you growing up, sharing stories, hanging out or doing things together. Beautiful post! 🙂
Thanks, Yen. Next September we’ll have been best friends for 50 years!
How wonderful you have a friend who has been around practically your whole life. I am so glad to hear this story.
My best friend moved to Dayton, Ohio from Texas and it was she who introduced me to “Frisch’s Big Boy”, the little guy in the checkered pants.
I wonder if he’s still there, Georgette. Do you still see your friend?
She married a Dutch South African in her 20’s. We kept up through correspondence and I saw her when she came to visit her parents. We exchanged some long distance calls. The last time I saw her was Easter of 2000. The last e-mail I got from her was 2008. As you can tell, I wish we could still continue an e-mail, fb or blogging correspondence.
No, the little guy is no longer there. A college friend from Cincinnati took me to Dayton for a day in 2009, and I looked for signs of the checkered pants boy, but didn’t see any.
Still good memories.
Wow, she really moved far away. Hard to remain close from that distance. It was tough when we moved to Texas in 1980 and Linda was in Connecticut. Since we were both working and raising kids, we couldn’t just drop everything and visit each other, plus the price of plane tickets was an issue. It’s so much easier now that I’ve moved closer and we’re both retired.
Oh, and I’m sad to hear about the little guy in the checkered pants, Georgette. 😦
I love the childhood memories the most, particularly the story about the puzzle pieces. It’s such a snippet into your past together, beautifully told.
Enjoy your vacation with your sister-friend-sister and the rest of your family 🙂
Thanks, Angela. Thinking of those days still makes me smile.
Great story! I love all my sisters… the one who shares my parents and the ones who became family. What would we do without them?
I have no idea, Shary! My life would be a lot emptier, that’s for sure!
Heck, *I* love Linda and I’ve never met either of you! What a fabulously written memoir. Women friends are so awesome, aren’t they? Man, I need to start calling some of mine …
Ha-ha! That made me laugh. It would make Linda laugh, too. I had so much more to say about her, but the meme limited us to 600 words. Drat those memes!
I love these sweet memories of a sister friend. it’s once in a lifetime we are blessed with a friend that sticks with us throughout our whole lives and you are very blessed indeed. I got chills when I read ,” oh Susan I am so sorry. I’m coming.” That’s a real sister isn’t it?
Yes, Julie, she is truly a blessing. Believe it or not, I gained another sister my senior year in college and we are as close now as we ever were. I’m doubly blessed.
Long-lasting friendships with our sister-friends are such a treasure. Lovely post — will look forward to your post next summer about your Cape Cod “family reunion.” 🙂
It will be in celebration of our 40th wedding anniversary. Our anniversary is actually in February—not a good time to go to the Cape!
This brought tears to my eyes! I never had even one sister but always wanted one — and I was never so fortunate to have someone like Linda either. You are one lucky woman! 🙂
I feel very fortunate because I gained a third sister in college. I was Joanie’s resident advisor, and we are still best friends today. In fact she came for a week a couple of months ago, and we just came back from an extended weekend with her and her husband in Rehoboth Beach. Linda and I, though, have been together nearly fifty years. Hard to believe she’s so old.
Now I’m just plain JEALOUS…. three sisters? *sigh* Thank goodness you’re the young one 😉
Actually, I’m the middle one. Joanie is the baby. I was her resident advisor in college. She was a sophomore and I was a senior. But at our ages, a couple of years means nothing—we’re all old! LOL!
Oh! Goose-bumps! What a GREAT ending!
I love the way that so often a best friend is defined as the one who comes over! Whatever the crisis may be, who ever you can call and they will be there… that’s a best friend!
I especially enjoyed your early paragraphs – they really painted a picture of a young girl’s friendship that were universal!
I could totally relate, even though my best friend and I had ice-cream/popcorn parties and bedazzled our skirts, instead of making them by hand!
🙂
Love how women can develop these deep and abiding friendships and feel sad for the women who don’t have a best friend. I actually have two of them, the other, Joanie, I met my senior year in college. Thanks for visiting, Barbara, and taking the time to comment.
What a lovely, cherished memory–thanks for sharing.
Thanks, Patti. I think many women share similar experience, but I don’t think as many men are as fortunate.
That’s really touching. cAPE COD must be wonderful. I hope you blog your trip!
Cape Cod is such a quaint, very New England place that is so relaxing. Lots of pretty beaches, great little shops, and artsy communities. You’d love it, GCB!
Coming East, this is great! Your story reminds me of the book, “I know just what you mean.” by Ellen Goodman and Patricia O’Brien. http://www9.nytimes.com/books/first/g/goodman-know.html
Here’s to your Summer 2012 on the Cape!
I just checked out that NYTimes article, Lenore. I would love to read that book, and I’ll bet Linda would, too. Thanks a bunch.