Happy Birthday Terre

It's funny how I have a whole store of memories linked to you, my childhood friend.

I remember swinging on the swings next to you in Michel's Park & agreeing out loud that we should stay 11 forever.
I remember you inviting me to your house for your birthday & your sister made you Baked Alaska, & you wanted me to try it. I never ever heard of Baked Alaska.

I remember sitting in an ambulance choking on steak & you told me later that you were on the Howitt baseball field & watched as it raced down the street with the sirens blaring unaware that it was me that they were taking to the hospital.

I remember looking at a picture of an old Dutch colonial house with you in your parents kitchen as we imagined that some day we would live next door to each other in houses like that.

I remember you convincing me I better start attending Mass every Sunday if I didn't want to go to Hell when I died. You went with me every Sunday that you could after that.

I remember singing next to you in church sitting behind a boy I had a bad crush on-your idea.

I can't remember if I was still trying to fix you up with him at the time. We were 16 (?)

I remember when you were falling in love with your husband you told me he wasn't like any other guy you ever met & how he read Thoreau...if I remember correctly, he read it aloud to you.

I remember going to visit you with my husband (the boy I had the crush on) & how when you left the room this wonderful man you were in love with made sure to thank us for coming to see you because it meant so much to you.

I remember when you asked me to be your maid of honor how happy I was because I knew I was competing with 8 sisters.

I remember going to visit you again but this time you had a little baby boy & you and I along with our husbands watched & laughed while Nate sat before us totally content in a milk stupor while Bob your cat banged on the window alerting you to let him in from the cold outside.

I remember one Christmas you & I upstairs at my parents house & we sat together as you nursed your beautiful Maddie.

I remember a lot more but I am getting too emotional & mostly I want to tell you on your birthday the same thing you wrote to me in my eighth grade yearbook:

"No man is an island. I am a part of every man I have met and every man that I have met is a part of me." -Thomas Merton

Man am I glad I've been spending so much time with you.

Yep, that is what you wrote to me at the end of eighth grade Terre. So here I am saying it right back at you. & Thanks for all the memories & being my friend all these years.