gold

There was a time in my life when I could count my girlfriends on one hand. Less than that. I couldn't stand the drama, the cat fights, the competition, the backstabbetyness. The full frontal assaults. It was too much. Boys were easier. And they didn't steal your shirts.

For the most part.

The tables have turned. Now it's the boys that are a drag. Most of them are totally kittywhipped, which blows. They used to be fun. Now they can't do anything without asking. 35 is the new 5. Mother May I?

What happened? Break free, boys. Dave and I were just talking about you the other day. I asked him if he's noticed it. He did. I asked him if I keep him down. He said no. I hope he didn't just say that so I wouldn't ground him and make him clean out the basement.

Anyway. The tables have turned.

I spend most Wednesday nights with my best localgirls. They spend most Wednesday nights with me. We eat and drink and talk about things we aren't supposed to talk about. That we aren't supposed to admit out loud. Things that make us weak. Scared. Happy. Horny. Pretty. Fat. Drunk. Calm. Silly. Straight. Old. Young. Us.

I spent this past Wednesday night with some of the girls who saw me through my Quarter Life Crisis. And they still answer my calls. Did you know me when I was 25? I was awesome. Just ask me.
Totally put together with focused direction and blinding sobriety.
You could really tell that by looking at me.
Me with my tank tops and platform shoes and Molly Ringwald hair and blue eye makeup.
I wouldn't give those days back. They were the second best days of my life.
We girls got each other through the rocky part of our twenties and now we are grownups. We are wives, mothers, educated, careered, committed, responsiblesque. And now we get to see each other through these times. We can laugh about this. We can cry. We can talk about it. We don't have to whisper. We don't have to lift anything up or suck anything in to feel good enough. We can Just. Be.

We earned it.

I spent Thursday afternoon at one of the Broad Street McDonalds with someone who I have known for 28 years. That is freakishly long. When we see each other the years fall away and we know how to put ourselves in a bubble and talk obnoxiously fast at the same time as the other and still hear every word spoken. We can cover a decade in ten minutes. A lifetime over frenchfries. And not leave anything out. It's always been that way, ever since the playground. Our lives are very different, but our experiences aren't and that's what counts.

Through all this I've learned there is something that runs through all of us. Something that is part of something huge. Something we all share. Something we won't share. Something that is so precious that we hide it, we steal it, we cherish it, we despise it. We seek it, we flee it. It hurts. It heals. It's yours it's mine it's ours it's nobody's. I'm not sure what it is, but I know what it feels like. It is bigger than me but small enough to fit inside my heart. My fist. My embrace. My voice.

It's motherhood. It's sisterhood. It's womanhood.
It's our lifeblood. It's a deathshroud.
It's the secret of everything.
It's why we are here.
Why we were born this way, with innie privates rather than outie.
I'm convinced.

I could end this blog right now.
Today.
I have figured out something huge that I've been struggling with for years through thinking and writing and sharing and asking but now that it's all straight in my head, I can't find the words to explain what it was that I was looking for in the first place. I think that means I win.
Today.

But it is 11.55 at night, so who knows what tomorrow will bring so I'll be back. Dragging us through 5000 word posts full of nonsense and madness and an order that makes sense in my head but not so much in words while I tackle something else.

Something bigger, something smaller, something different.