Sitting on the bench like bookends

There’s a Simon and Garfunkle song called Old Friends with a line in it that says:

“Old friends… sat on the park bench like bookends.”

I always liked that line, though never really considered what it might mean.

This week I have an “old friend” visiting.

We have not seen each other in almost two years. Our phone calls and emails have been far too few and in between.

Much has happened in our lives since we were last together.

Since having her here I’ve thought many times that it feels like an eternity since I last saw her (when you consider all that’s happened in both of our lives since tehn). And yet at the same time I also feel like she never left.

Being together again is so normal, so right.

Ryan and I have said that many times about our own kids as well.

In some ways it seems like not that long ago that we were in Spain, just the two of us, living on a dime with the whole future before us.

But it also feels like a lifetime ago.

It’s hard to rememver our lives without the kids, now tht they are such a part of it.

(We like it that way.)

And as I soak up the time with my dear firend, I think about what once was between us. It—too—feels like a lifetime ago, and yet also feels like yesterday.

The “bookends” thing finally makes a little sense.

We’re far apart and yet the stories between us, the shared experiences, the challenges, memories, discussions, growth, and laughter… Those things will always be between us, giving us something to hold up and hold onto.

And finally, I’m a litle more comfortable on my park bench.

 

STOP.

 

Q for you: Have you ever thought of yourself as a bookend – holding up volumes of stories and memories?

 

Love,
A

 

Click Clink Five is a blog by Adriel Booker. | Five minutes a day, unedited. | 2012 All rights reserved. | Adriel also writes on parenting and motherhood at The Mommyhood Memos.