THE BITCHES ARE (NOT BACK) BUT HERE TO STAY

The emails read “Hike Smuggler 10 AM who’s in?” Or “Fri. Bike Bells 9 AM then lunch at Peaches for Sally’s B-day”. Yes it’s in shorthand but it doesn’t matter because we tend to finish each others sentences anyway! These communications come minimally once a week. My girlfriends are a big part of my life. When life allows, I probably spend as much time with them as I do with my family. One of them remarked that with this group of friends, she’s had the longest, enduring and most constant friendships of her life and I think that holds true for most of us. We’ve shared kids woes, marital woes, weight woes, hormonal woes and vacations and celebrations too numerous to count with and with out our spouses and families.

How do I know that these friendships are authentic? Well, for one thing we keep one another’s secrets and confidences, which is a whole lot easier these days as we all tend to forget a lot and seem to be losing our minds together! We check in with weekly stream of consciousness phone calls, talk about the same things over and over that take up way too much of our day and that our spouses are not even remotely interested in listening to. And even though we know we should get off the phone, we always have just one more pressing thing to say! We all believe that through our collective wisdom we can solve just about anything the world throws our way. We take the time to make one another feel special. We celebrate all of our birthdays together. It’s often times just a simple walk and meet for coffee but no one is forgotten. Like all women we can be insecure, petty and judgmental at times but we all know with complete certainty that if there is a need we’d be there for one another at the drop of a hat no questions asked.

The dynamic of the group is interesting as well. We all have different personalities and backgrounds. Some are native “aspenites” and others moved here from other parts of the country, married and ended up raising our families in this glorious place. We are together, crazy, intense, competitive, caring, fun, needy, supportive, curious, creative, complicated, gracious and so very fortunate to be a part of one anothers lives.

We spur each other on to be more, do more and be better women and friends. Through it all as we’ve grown together I’ve learned to judge less and understand more. Because of my girlfriends I laugh harder and with abandon from experiences shared over years that are treasured.