The taxis pull up to the off campus apartment to take us into Boston. We tumble outside and into the waiting vehicles, giggling and excited for our night on the town. We’ve been waiting for months to celebrate our 21st birthdays together, and I’ve been the hold up as the youngest in the group. Now we all have licenses that allow us to order drinks whenever we wish and enter any bar that we want. This being Boston where ancient Blue Laws still exist, the night will end by 2 a.m. But that’s OK. What matters is that we’re all finally together after the previous semester of being apart.
The next time we go into Boston for a night out, I drive. After circling Newberry Street for what seems like an eternity, we finally find a place to park. But it’s a parallel parking space, and I don’t really know how to get into it. (Gulp). In the state of Illinois, where I took drivers’ ed, parallel parking is not required to obtain a license, so I never really bothered to learn. After several failed attempts, two of my friends hop out to guide me. A couple of strangers stop to join the party on the sidewalk, and my friends who remain in the car duck down giggling. After multiple attempts, I manage to squeeze my SUV into the tight spot. Those of us still in the car climb out, and we all burst into hysterical laughter, which continues until we reach the restaurant.
We started bonding our freshman year, but it was as sophomores that our friendships solidified. That was when we won the housing lottery with one of the coveted suites earmarked for students in their second year at Brandeis. I felt especially lucky, since my friends pulled me in at the last minute. Later I learned that I was not everyone’s first choice as the eighth member of the suite, though I think in the end no one had any regrets with the decision. We did, however, find ourselves having regrets about some of the other members of our suite, and by the time the first semester ended, our merry band of eight had become six.
The reasons varied why those two young women left our prized residence, but in that sick and twisted way of late adolescence, their departures bonded the six of us who remained ever tighter. We finished out the year all under the same roof together, then divided up into two groups of three for our second half of college. Yet even though we never all lived together after that sophomore year, we continued to do everything together. A constant state of joining up and dispersing made our rhythms like those of a family. We’d meet in the student union for lunch; go our separate ways to classes or the gym or activities; then find ourselves, once again, at the same table for dinner. Every weekend we would end up at parties or in Boston or Cambridge. It didn’t matter where, really. All that mattered was that we were together.
In college, there seems to be a boundless amount of time to laugh, talk and cry together, as if time has no limits, so different from grown-up life. During our 20s, when we all lived in New York, separately but in the same city, we continued to see each other often. When children started coming, and city apartments gave way to suburban abodes, our time together became less frequent. But there’s something about those friendships at 19 that keep things ticking, even when we don’t see or speak or hang out together as much anymore.
Today, our group of six has boiled down to four. I recently reconnected with a fifth member of our tribe on Facebook, and after all these years without contact it was wonderful to see her smiling face again. My other three friends all live on the East Coast, while I’m here in suburban Chicago. It seems they don’t see each other all that often, but I wish they did. Even though I can’t be with them, it would bring me comfort to know that they were together. Now I only get glimpses of my friends’ lives on Facebook, which I just joined a few short months ago. For years my friends begged me to set-up an account, so they could see me and my family. I wish I had listened. We might not be able to be together, but at least Facebook helps us to not feel so far apart.
We all turned 40 this year. We all celebrated. But unlike our 21st birthdays, none of us did so together. Marking milestones separately is now our norm. And yet I still feel tethered to all of them. That commodity called time, which bonded us together in our college days, is so much more precious and rare these days. But I know if we could find the time to all gather together, it would be as if a day had not gone by. There wouldn’t be any awkward pauses; no lack of laughter. We would fill every second, every minute, every moment talking, as if we had just left our coveted suite all together.
This has been a Finish the Sentence Friday post. This week’s prompt is “When I was 19 years old…”
Hosted by: Kristi at findingninee.com, Yours Truly of mimisager.com, and Vidya at Coffee with Mi.
Mimi, I have a post with a similar feel that has been sitting in my editing pile for awhile now – I just can’t seem to wrap it up the way I’d like. There are five of us left, roommates who have gotten lost in our own lives but still manage to meet up for one weekend a year. And when we do, it takes us no time at all to reconnect. They are the only women in my life who really knew me before I was a mother, and that is something special.
So well put Dana. There is something special about those friends who knew us when. 🙂 Jealous that you and your friends get a weekend away together every year. This post seems to have spurred some action among my friends to find a time to see one another. I’m hoping it comes to fruition! And if you find a way to wrap up your piece similar to this one would love to see it. Always enjoy your writing! Thanks for joining me here!
Mimi, I kind of hate you write now, You look EXACTLY the same!!!! And how much fun it must have been to be a young, pretty college student in one of my favorite vitiates! Eight to a suite at the at age – who, there must have been some drama, I’m sure.
You might hate me, but I love you for saying that!!! 🙂 Even though it isn’t true. 😉 There was definitely drama. But those of us who stayed really did bond something special. I know you know how great Boston is, and it was truly magical to be in college there! Thanks for joining me here!
College roommates. The best of times and the worst of times! Some left my life forever, while 1 was my maid of honor and best friend to this day. Such highs and lows. As an introvert, I sort of want to win the lottery and build dorms full of single rooms at my college!
That’s well put about the best of times and worst of times. Thank you Katy and Charles Dickens! 🙂 As an extrovert, I loved living with a big group, and once our group became six, each of us got our own room, which definitely made it easier in some ways. Thanks for joining me here!
The university I went to was literally just across the street. So I didn’t have college roommates. Now that my two kids live across the country and are enjoying the roommate life I live through them. It’s a magical time. You should organize a reunion with yours. GO do it. Now. Oh the memories you’ll share.
Kelly, we are working on taking your advice and trying to organize a reunion of sorts. I hope it happens! And you know I’ll write about it if it does. 🙂 Thanks for joining me here!
I so so love this, Mimi. My two oldest friends are sisters. I first met one of them on the airplane on the way to college and just had dinner with her Tuesday night. We, too, live in separate cities but the laughter picks up right where it left off. Gorgeous. Also, I agree with whoever said that you look exactly the same!
Thanks for hosting with me this week, Sweets. xo
Don’t you just love that when you can pick right back up as if no time has passed? So glad you have those friendships like this too. And thank you for your kind words about looking the same, even though it doesn’t seem that way to me. This was a fun prompt. So glad I got to co-host with you! xo
I think the bond we make with friends in university is special. There is a time and space, discovering of life that happens then and so the people you do that with always hold a special place in your heart.
I enjoyed reading about your group of close friends here.
So well put Louise! It really is a special time and space that allows for life discoveries and special bonding. Thank you for joining me here!
Mimi– this explains so well how I feel about my college friends. (And I’m also the one Midwesterner with everyone else on the East Coast.) But it’s amazing how we can have such intense years together and then it’s just how it is that we live separate lives.
Love that you can relate too Nina! I agree that dichotomy is amazing, but it still makes me sad that I don’t see my girls more often or ever really. This post is spurring us to action. I hope our reunion actually takes place! Thanks for joining me here. We need to catch up!!
That’s feeling tethered in the nicest way possible, Mimi! I am still in close touch with my classmate-buddies-soul sisters and nothing in the world is equal to that bond we share. This week’s prompt is beautiful. How wonderful to go down memory lane like this and remember ….and retain the good stuff. Hugs! Happy to be cohosting with you!
Thanks Vidya! I really enjoyed this week’s prompt as well and co-hosting with you! It is such fun to go down memory lane. 🙂 Thanks for joining me here!
That sounds like my sister – she had a group of 8, dwindled down to 6, and now at least four of them are still close. And Facebook is weird like that. I cannot even imagine joining FB now… were you to totally inundated with friend requests? I started in 2008 so I’ve been watching people come in and out for years. It’s so interesting!
And I love how you describe a night out in Boston.
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Ah.. to be 19 again for a night.
Thanks Tamara! In hindsight I wish I’d been on since 2008. But isn’t it always 20/20 like that? I was inundated with friend requests at first, then it slowed down, came in some spurts, and now it’s the intermittent one here and there. I think people were shocked to see me there b/c I had been a hold out. Ironically, my college friends didn’t even come up ih my feed b/c our lives now are so separated. I had to seek each of them out and send them requests before they even knew I had joined. Go figure! Thanks for joining me here!
Love it! There’s nothing like the friendships made in college. It’s so great that you have stayed such good friends.
Mimi, I really liked this. It took me directly to the feelings and relationships I still have with my college roommates. We are all over the country but manage to get some one on ones with each other via our travels. It looks like these friendships will literally last our lifetimes. Thanks for your great piece
Your continued friendships are inspiring for me! I love that you have all been there for each other over the years and that I have had the opportunity to meet some of them as well. College is a special time. It’s wonderful when we can make a part of those years last well past our time on campus. 🙂
looks “sterile”. I enjoy living in my neorobiughhod in Ottawa now as there is more life on the front lawns. One person down the street is actually growing grapes on a canopy over their front lawn. Otherwise it seems like just a waste of space for a monospecies.