Wednesday 5 September 2007

Losing Loved ones

I recently commented that these days I seem to socialse electronically.
Once you have children and give up your previous job and previous life, things you had in common with friends often disappear and your social aquaintances become your children's friends' parent's (did I get that right?).
One of my most favourite pair of friends are my daughters best friends' parents. If my daughter hadn't made friends with their son we would never have met them. The dad is Godfather to my youngest daughter and I feel so very fortunate to know them.
I also find that now I'm older, I value friendship so much more than I ever did, because of course as an adult, it's a stronger emotional thing to really adore your friends. I don't think I realised that when I was younger, but that's certainly the case for me.
A very good friend of ours moved to Scotland a few years ago. She rang me to warn me that she'd bought a house in Scotland and would be moving as soon as they had sold down here. I cried and cried (much to my surprise I have to say). I was going to miss her and who was going to speak in French to my children? It felt awful. Now we are used to it, they visit twice a year and phone often, we still all adore them, but they aren't here.
This week my daughters' Headmistress has announced she's leaving, Ok so I'm not wildly in love with her, don't get me wrong, but I hate the change, I was comfortable in knowing her ethos on my daughters' education. Now I have to start a whole new relationship with someone else. I suppose I feel too tired to start again with someone new, I just don't want my comfortable relationships with friends and associates to change.
I haven't been blogging that long, but I feel I've discovered a whole new world of women like myself, feeling like they have a teenage mind in an older body. Still with a wicked sense of humour, but without an outlet for it (I'm just so embaressing). And I have to say I read the same blogs, sometimes daily, to see what funny things have happened to them. I cry laughing, I sit here, and as I look up from my work I gaze at a garden bursting with colour, I can see no other house from my window, just flowers, fields and mountains, yet even in this remote part of the world I feel a connection with people I don't even know. Laughter certainly is the best medicine.
The sad thing this week has been the posting by Drunk Mummy saying she's giving up blogging. I'm honestly gutted. She was the first co-blogger who made me realise I'm not the only one. I wish her every success.

9 comments:

Pig in the Kitchen said...

Ahhhh, well put. I hate the change of people moving on, or of me having to move. I don't like the ground shifting beneath my feet.
And as for Drunk Mummy, well, our low-level coercion campaign is not working, we may have to slaughter one of your horses and use its head, you get my drift?

Iota said...

Merry Daze (www.merrydaze.blogspot.com) said she was leaving blogging and then came back. I suspect that happens to a few people. Maybe Drunk Mummy will find the addiction harder to kick than she thinks...

Have lurked your blog for a while, and am now driven to comment.

Rosie said...

I related to a lot of what you said. When my daughter's nursery nurse said she was leaving last year I sobbed and sobbed even though I did not know her. Even though I'm 34 I still feel about 14 years old when come to accept and coping with people leaving and moving on.

PS I know a few people who have decided to give up blogging but have not be able to stay away. In fact I've done it twice!

Potty Mummy said...

Change? Who needs it, I say. I agree whole-heartedly with your comments, and if Pig's Italian Mafiosi approach doesn't work my husband knows some very unpleasant people in Moscow...

Suffolkmum said...

I loved this, it summed up much of what I have been thinking lately I'm rubbish at change anyway, but friendships become so precious as we get older, and it really hurts when friends move on. The headmistress at my children's primary is due to retire soon - I'm already in denial.

Frog in the Field said...

Pig in the Kitchen, you're getting too emotional and used to the French way of life...a horses head?? Now, I thought you were vegetarian, anyway, we don't have any horses......and you lay a hands on my pet pigs and we're over!!

Iota, thanks for commenting. It hasn't crossed my mind that I had a lurker. You've a good point, it probably isn't that easy giving up blogging, it does become addictive.

Ah Ingenious Rose, you soppy thing, thank goodness, I'm not the only one. I knew I had an affinity with you ladies!

Potty Mummy, I'm shocked!
Or should we called you Potski Mumski?

Thanks Suffolk Mum, a flattering comment indeed. I don't think teachers and Heads realise how much we depend on them being there forever, unless of course we despise them and then we can't wait for them to retire.

Elsie Button said...

i too am gutted about drunk mummy leaving. GUTTED.

Livvy U. said...

Hello, I haven't visited before, but thought this is a true, true post. I have also found great comfort in the community that is bloggers doing their thing, and enormous support from the comments I've been left time and again.
And friendships do seem to matter so very much more as you grow older. Something to do with witnessing, and being witnessed, by the same people over a period of time. Poignant good thoughts of yours.

Frog in the Field said...

Thanks for visiting Livvy, I really appreciate you kind comments.