Birthday Lunch

Today, I am sending birthday wishes to my friend, Lori! We have been friends since we were in the fifth grade, around 12 years old, and that's about 44 years! That is what I call a long term relationship! Our parents are friends, so we were brought up with similar values and belief systems, and I believe that is why we have had such a strong friendship all these years. 

We grew up together through our teen years, even though she lived about five hours away from me. We kept in touch through the mail, and she made several trips to Portland every year, one of them for three weeks of camp during the summer. Then came the boyfriend years, and what a great time that was! We both married young and then came the pregnant years. We were there to help each other out while we were raising our kids, eight between us, plus dogs and other assorted pets. We have been through every stage of life together, plus numerous challenges that life has brought our way, some of them good, some of them very difficult, but we have always remained friends.

Even though we are a lot alike, we are actually very different in many ways. She has strengths that I don't have and so I look to her for information and advice about things that she stays well informed about. I have my own strengths that I offer to our friendship. It just works!

I have spent more consecutive hours on the phone with her than anyone else in my life, and I could not even estimate how many hours it has been. When we get on the phone together, it is never a casual or quick conversation. Oh, no! Not even close! I would say the shortest conversations we have are two hours, but three plus hours are normal for us. Especially through the past 15 years that I have lived away from the Portland area.

Today, being her birthday, we had a "Birthday Lunch" over the phone! It wasn't Gustav's, but sometimes you need to work with what you have, and when you are a 1000 miles apart, the phone is what worked today!! 

Lori, I wish I could bake you a birthday cake today, but since it won't work out this year, I'm going to post a Raw Apple Cake recipe that you gave me over 30 years ago. You probably still have this recipe, but in case you don't, here it is!

So to you, Lori, I say again, Happy Birthday! Thank you for your friendship. I feel so blessed to have had you as a sister friend all these years. We have shared laughs and tears, good times and hard times, and my life would have a big hole in it if you weren't there! Have a wonderful year and I hope all your wishes come true!