Some 30 years ago, this month, I met my best friend. This is her poem; I would like to assure her it's not written solely to embarrass her, although I will get a laugh out of that I admit. It's written because it's been thirty years in the writing, in pubs and clubs, over coffee and in hospital rooms, and once upon a time, in a school room in a convent on the Crumlin Road.This is one of those poems, that had to be written and that were in a sense always written.
After thirty years our lives have coincided again; we have always been there but at times our experiences have been out of sync. One married while the other was single, one away or at home, happy or sad; now the stars align once more and we share a certain common ground, marriage and motherhood. I don't know what has been sweeter in 30 years, the times when we were apart but still holding on or now that we are older, wiser, calmer, and more on the same path. Both times have their joys.
This is for you Emer, from the heart. From all us oddballs.
Sit here
I heard on
the news, those dreaded words of childhood
“Back to
school,” the death knell of summer, the last nail
in the
coffin for the halcyon freedoms of our youth;
I heard it
and thought, it’s September – remember! remember
when that
meant schoolbags and books and copies and pencils
and
suddenly thought, how long have I known her?
How many years? How many seasons, since that
first Autumn,
how many
days, since that first day of a new school year?
I walked
in, my usual self; constrained by my lumpiness and
dumpiness.
I walked in and paused. My usual tactic was to
see where
there might be a seat – unobtrusive, unwanted, unlikely
to offend
anyone else. Perhaps on the edge of a group, that way I could
occasionally,
if the omens were good, turn and talk or share a joke –
as long I
didn’t push my luck. I couldn’t see a seat.
I saw her.
She smiled and pointed to the seat in front. She had already
found a
niche, made a friend, settled in. She pointed to a seat and then to me.
I don’t
remember sitting down. I don’t remember the first halting chat.
I remember
laughing. If I had to sum up the next thirty years, my friend,
her spirit,
I would say…I remember laughing. There’s no end to her laughter,
her good
nature. She is kind. Everyone who meets her, says that. She is kind.
She has a
knack with us oddballs, she is Mamma to us all. She has a way of
making you
feel as if you belong. She has made me feel that for thirty years,
while I did
my best to cast myself adrift, while I spun aimlessly out of orbit.
I never
knew until I returned, she held a thread and refused to let it go.
I know as
she reads this she will – blush, shake her head, laugh at me (gently)
I know she
will be pleased, and she will be perplexed. I imagine her shrugging
off
compliments, with a certain giggle and a wave of her hand – ah go on!
But we, we
who know her value, we must drag her back up to her pedestal
and bribe
her up there with yellow rice and wine. We need her, her calm hand upon
the helm;
her eyebrow raised. She is our fixed compass, our northern star.
She is my
memory and my youth. She is one of the moments on which my life turned.
She is
still that girl, the one who points and says, “Sit here.”
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