I dropped my towel in a patch of high grass and ran alone until my legs gave out from under me. I found myself surrounded by bending field grass. I lay back, listening to my heart and breath, quick from the running and the daring. I could hear Alegra panting nearby. For one moment, everything made sense. We were pure, perfect. I stretched, and there was Alegra’s hand, a spark of sisterhood's promise passing between our fingers.
We wrapped our drenched towels around us for the walk up the hill, not caring about how odd we must look. By the time we reached our door, we had come to a few silent conclusions: That our bodies were to be cherished, that some moments are meant to be seized, and that there is no feeling in the world like rain on an unashamed heart.
—JENNIFER BERNSTEIN-LEWIS
“Each friend represents a world in us,
a world possibly not born
until they arrive…”
—Anaïs Nin
the 5 friends every chick needs
When we were mere chicks, we always had a best friend. There were other friends, of course, but the word best was reserved for that one special sisterfriend, soulmate, forever buddy—no matter the situation, we only needed her. Like Miss America, there could only be one girl wearing that satin sash glittered with the words, Best Friend. While your childhood best buddy will always be the sister of your heart, geography, jobs, and life in general make that singular reliance on one another impossible. Part of growing up is expanding your heart and your circle of friends along with it. Like any good team, a girlfriend gang evolves because each woman brings a unique perspective or strength to the franchise. In that spirit, we think there are 5 chicks that every woman needs in her court. You can get by with fewer if they can multi-task.
the “I've Seen You with Braces and Bell-Bottoms” friend
This is the one that knows where you live. Not only literally, but that figurative place where it all began. You bonded over jumping rope, passing notes, and gushing over teen idols. She knows your family, how you crashed your first car into a pole the day after your sixteenth birthday, and she didn't laugh when you wore a 32 AAA bra. Your friendship is based on the deep roots that come from knowing each other through all the big and little events that propel us into adulthood. She understands where you are coming from and helps you get where you want to go,
the biological buddy
This is the friend that mirrors your family status. If you have children, so does she, and hopefully her kids are close enough in age to yours that you can bemoan the dilemmas of potty training or car seats together. You listen patiently to her stories about junior, nod in the right places and then it's your turn. You swoop in in a crunch to babysit or pick the kids up from school and vice versa. It's a beautiful thing. On the flipside, this friend may be the one among your group that, like you, doesn't have children. Together you celebrate your freewheeling status at fancy restaurants where you couldn't find a high chair to save your life. You go to museum openings, see movies with subtitles, and indulge in marathon shopping excursions. Don't call me before 9 AM? No worries about getting any guff, she too is still asleep.
your own personal Martha Stewart
She knows everything from how to get candle wax off your cat's ear to what color shoes to wear with a celadon silk suit. Need a recipe for champagne punch? She'll fax over five of them and would make the champagne if she needed to. Roof leaking? She's there with some shingles and tar that she happened to have in the workshop. She has every tool, every recipe, and every magazine article cross-referenced and indexed, and she's as resourceful as the FBI, CIA, and Interpol combined. She is irreplaceable,
your sister-in-a-suit
She knows how much your salary is and was instrumental in getting it there by counseling you before your last big performance review. You share investment tips, career strategies, and the secrets of crafting the world's perfect resume. What to wear to that interview? She's the one you turn to. Powerhouse, confidante, and the Wall Street Journal in comfortable pumps—she's a source of professional inspiration and awfully fun to have drinks with after work, to boot.
wild woman
You've always been curious about male strip clubs but never had the nerve to ask any of your usual friends to go to one. Bingo—wild woman is your ticket—she's probably done something crazy like work in one in the past. Nothing will shock her, and the word judgment (for better or worse) is not in her vocabulary. You can tell her anything. No matter how serious or benign, she takes it in stride on her way to the next ad venture. When you're with her, hang on tight and never use your real name.
a Little niGhT MischIef
This isn't only my story. It belongs to all 258 of us who, in the fall of 1955, arrived at Saint Mary's College, a small women's liberal arts school in Indiana, with pie-in-the-sky dreams and pockets full of good intentions. Settling into the freshman hall, we unpacked our quilted poodle skirts, arranged our mandatory dresser scarves, and, as suggested in our freshman handbook, decorated our rooms with something “green and growing.”
In spite of rigid rules and stiff curfews, we generally managed to stay in the good graces of our dean for most of the year—until an epidemic of spring fever, complicated by a severe case of exam jitters, struck unexpectedly in late May. As dogwood blossoms enticed our collective noses from our books, Dante, Dickens, and diameters gave way to seductive visions of dunes and warm sand between our toes. While we watched with envy from behind dog-eared Western Civ notes, indulgently carefree seniors, finished with exams and newly graduated, cavorted around campus in flagrant disregard for our sorry lot.
It may have started with the food fight that erupted among several freshman tables back in a corner of the dining room—an unheard-of occurrence, rendered possible only by the departure of the seniors, whose job it was to instruct the younger students on table etiquette and the art of conversation. Our laughter, sucked in and squelched between fork-flicked mashed potatoes, had never felt so good. The exhilaration of that tiny, insignificant act of anarchy galvanized us as a class. As we giggled and guffawed our way back to our hall, the plot thickened.
There's no question the troops were restless and ready for a little harmless insurrection. There was no instigator or mastermind. It was mob rule, plain and simple. Before long, a plan was formulated. We would strike late, after our ever-vigilant dean had gone to bed.
Focused as we were on the mischief of the moment, exams were the furthest thing from our minds. Between fits of giggles, my three roommates and I put on our PJs, brushed our teeth, smeared our faces with Noxema, and hurried to bed as soon as it was “lights out.” We heard the dean make rounds. Then all was silent. Daring to communicate only occasionally with faint whispers or hand movements, we lay in bed waiting. Then, around midnight, we heard it! The horrific crash of a transom, about two floors above us, followed by another and another and another—like a volley of cannon fire. The noise—magnified four times over by cavernous linoleum halls, vaulted ceilings, and broad wooden stairwells—echoed throughout the building, from its bowels to its towers, like the deep belches of thunder on a summer night.
When the banging and the crashing started, I lay momentarily paralyzed, not expecting the sound to be so deafening. But as soon as the room next to us fired off their salvo, my roommates and I jumped into action. I'll admit I expected the dean to arrive any second, and prayed my father would understand my suspension, or worse, dismissal, while I watched Mary, Susy, and Connie take their turns lustily lowering and slamming the transom. When it was my turn, I sailed out of bed, apprehension changing to exhilaration in midstride, and pulled the bar as hard as I could. As the resounding explosion catapulted down the hall to signal the next room, the four of us collapsed in a tangle of hysterical laughter.
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