Oreos & peanut butter

My mom, a SUNY Geneseo graduate of the 70s, still plans get togethers with her college girlfriends every couple months. They call themselves “Club”. My dad has also been fortunate enough to see his college buddies a few times a year, but his story is for another time. Today it’s about the ladies.

I met my best friend over oreos and peanut butter. We lived across the hall from each other in the freshmen dorms at St. Bonaventure University and bonded over our love for food, bright colors and happy music. As it turned out, Rachel’s mom also has “Club” – another ironic connection we found hard to dismiss. By the next year, our group became nine, and the nine of us have remained close ever since.

There’s something to be said about girlfriends who are unshaken by time, distance, change, broken hearts, wrong decisions, selfish decisions, and hours of repeated venting just because it’s a venting kind of day. My girlfriends are givers, teachers, travelers, lovers, supporters and every kind word you can think of in between. I truly do not know where I would be without them.

With the exception of my six-month-long internship at Walt Disney World during college, Chicago is the first place I have lived without one of these girls in seven years (and let’s face it, Disney expects kindness and love from its employees, so building friendships there was not much of a challenge). Now, I live with my boyfriend in one of the largest cities in the country and, while I love him dearly, he does not so much care for the smell of nail polish, three-hour gossip sessions over chips and chocolate, or whether I should opt for the long necklace or the big earrings with my outfit on Saturday night.

I guess that is what girlfriends are for – to remind us that we are always justified, never fat and that buying those cute new shoes is ALWAYS a good idea.

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Photo by SHAYAN IZADI ☄️ on Unsplash