Age is age, but I am grateful, always, for longevity

I have a friend.

That's how the stories begin. I have a friend, and we....

Here, today, is my "we" story.

I have a friend. I have known her forever. I have known her family, too. A little high school. A week in Hilton Head. All of college. Her graduate school. The little business I began. My wedding. Her wedding. Children. She has stood with me by mother's grave and has walked with me at the park, and I have walked with her. Last night her eldest graduated from high school and in the hours afterward, I sat in my friend's festive home, with my friend and my friend's mother, father, husband, sons. We sat as if it had not been years since we'd all been together.

I have reached that age when I value, enormously, long stretches, real memories, honest connections. People who don't just talk, but also listen. People whose children I prize and whose parents I know. People whose parents know me. The jokes are on us, and with us, and it is good to laugh, and we do.

Age is age, and I have regrets, of course.

But I am grateful (and will be until life is no more) for the room long friendships make for me.