Today has been emotional as I visited a friend who is very ill. I
prepared myself mentally as well as I could, having read up about the
condition; I knew I had to see him, I didn't want to leave it. Whilst so desperately sad to see a friend in such a
different state of health to how I've previously seen him, I am so
very glad I spent time with him and stayed strong in his presence.
The look on his face when he first saw me enter the room was so lovely, so uplifting
and precious – that special twinkle in his eyes, I wouldn't have appreciated before today just how much I could value that.
I don't want to dwell on the sadness of all this though, so
instead let me tell you about how we met. A few years ago, not long
after I started blogging, someone I didn't know at all left a
comment. I was curious as to who he was and how he might have found
his way to this site. As he later explained to me, he saw it on a
blog list and was immediately intrigued just by the name because he's
interested in birds. When he looked through my posts, he was
surprised to see how much else resonated. Likewise, curious about my new
visitor and interested in his comment, I ended up perusing his blog
too and found we had so many topics in common that it was almost
uncanny.
A little bit of lovely inter-blog banter ensued. It was clear
that we shared interests and experiences in music – punk in
particular – as well as in nature, and in art and illustration. We
discovered we'd even had the same art tutor for a while, even though
at different establishments. We found out we'd both been born in
London, both have connections to certain bands, that we like spiders
and insects, that we admire the same illustrators, like much of the
same comedy, that we'd both had certain family loss experiences and
so on and so on, and then we realised that
we even live in the
same county.
Whereabouts in the same county? I wondered... I left a cryptic
comment once, referring to the village I live in just by its
initials: “Maybe you know it? It's full of antique shops,” I
said.
The reply was quite cryptic too. “Yes, I know it. A fine place.”
Mutual trust established, our comment ping-pong then evolved into
email exchange. As our rapport and familiarity built we started to
reveal more about our locations. Right. We not only live in the
same county but, can you believe it? - we live in the same village!
And then guess what? We not only live in the same village, but
we
live in the same street!
Thus the virtual friendship became real – I only have to cross
the road and walk a few hundred yards down, after all! - and over a few years we've
shared many cups of tea and lively, lovely conversations, borrowed
each other's books and films and enjoyed one of those easygoing friendships that
is simple, unintrusive, unpressured, equal. The best kind, when you
don't need to see each other all that often, when nobody is offended
if you don't reply straight away to an email, but when you do meet
you rabbit for hours and don't want to stop. I'm so pleased we've
had that - and it all started here.