Four squared

Most highschool friends seem to part ways over time, their friendships predominently due to living nearby or going to the same school or having parents work at the same place.  Rarer still are those friends met in early childhood that remain friends in adulthood. And I would venture to say that many of those remain friends purely becuase they have known each other for so many years that they are part of one's life like a sibling or a cousin, or a freckle, and not necessarily someone you would ever meet or connect with if you were to meet them now.

When I was 9 I moved to a new school, which can be a litte traumatic for the average child.  For someone as small and scrawny and painfully shy as I was, starting at a new school was horrendous.  Every part of that first day is still indelibly marked in my brain, and easily accessed should the memory be required.

There was another new student that day, a boy from Quebec, a handsome extrovert.  For some reason, he connected with me and we became friends. Four years later, he moved back to Quebec, and so began a very long, lond distance friendship. We wrote to one another as we grew up, regularly recording our young lives to a sympathetic audience of 1. 

After 14 years of letters, we had a face to face meeting again, along with girlfriend, a sparkling beauty.  Despite our different career paths, we all connected.

More years, more events, some good, some not so good.  I'm in London, they are in Moscow.  Another meeting, this time including my boyfriend Martin.  Connection.

More years, more visits.  Sometimes in Vancouver (we are there by this time of course), but more often where they are, which changes every few years. Moscow, St. Louis, Geneva, Toronto, and now Vienna.

Emails and skype calls are all good across miles and time zones, but it's those face to face contacts that set a friendship in concrete. He and me, her and him, us, she and I, no matter which pairing or combination.  Concrete, I tell you.  Concrete.