Week 4: My First Friend

M and me at three

I had thought of sharing my memories of M under the heading, Someone from my Old Neighbourhood, but when I scrolled down the list of topics in this writing challenge, I thought that M is really not just someone from my childhood neighbourhood but is in fact among my very first friends. 

M and I were born less than a month apart.  We went to the same school from grade school to high school.  Most of our school mates had thought of us as cousins, and I never bothered to correct them for it was too complicated to explain that she's in fact my niece, being the eldest child of a cousin by one of my mother's nine siblings. 

At eight, M and I started taking piano lessons on weekends.  At first we looked forward to those weekends, not so much for the piano lessons, as for the opportunity to get away from home, eat cornicks from Emy's friend corn, and to read Liwayway comics that neither of our households had. Our teacher, who was an insomniac, would normally still be asleep when we arrive at her place.  She'd ask one of her grandchildren to ask either of us to start practising.We would initially want to grab the chance to play first as the teacher was still in upstairs and would therefore not be paying attention.  Or so we thought.  When she came downstairs about half an hour later, she'd ask us to repeat playing those parts  of the piece or Hanon exercise where we made mistakes.  And that was the end of the happy piano lessons for me. 

We would spend some weekends and summer days together playing all sorts of crazy games.  I remember the time we, together we other cousins, put down the curtains in our living room and put these on as gown as we had our make-believe beauty pageant. My fondest memories however were playing in the empty lot across their house, among tall wild grasses. My parents wouldn't have allowed that and so what joy it was to be able to sneak out and do that with M and her neighbours. 

I don't know when and how it exactly started but at some point we grew apart. When M's mom got seriously ill, my parents stopped me from going to their house.  They didn't want me to be an additional burden to the household. As I look back though I think one of the reasons for this drifting apart was that a part of me began to envy M.  Her family was financially better off than mine and so she could have many of the things I couldn't. I guess that made me slightly uncomfortable around her. Her being more articulate also bolstered my feelings of inferiority which as I would discover later started when my mother deliberately had us in different sections in pre-school because she thought I'd be teased by M and by my other classmates for being left-handed.  

It was only much later in my personal healing process that I got in touch with these memories and feelings.  At this point, our lives had almost completely gone separate ways as I got involved in social development work and eventually got married.  

Life however has a way of bringing together souls that share special inner ties. M left for Canada when we were in our early 30s and email brought us closer again.  She went through her own healing process and we've found in each other a kindred spirit in our own individual journeys. It was so healing for me to discover how very similar we actually were - the oddness of following the promptings of the Spirit in our work lives, the desire to break free from family patterns that no longer work, the deep sense of compassion for those who are marginalised and abused, and the interest in psycho-spiritual healing.  

We may have our own separate lives now, but, unlike before, we remain part of each other's lives despite the distance and our own preoccupations. An email or private message on Messenger can easily bridge all the physical and emotional distance between us.  I think of our friendship as a cross-stitch project.  We can put it down anytime to deal with daily practical concerns, but I know that when we pick it up again, we can easily build on from where we left off and create something that will enrich our lives.