Best Friends Forever - Irene S. Levine [94]
INTERGENERATIONAL FRIENDSHIPS
One less obvious way to replenish your stock of friends is to look for people older and younger than yourself with whom you share something in common. No matter which side of the equation you’re on, intergenerational friendships offer pluses for both people.
In the introduction to this book, I briefly mentioned my longest relationship, which happens to be intergenerational. I met Dr. Rita Dunn when I was just eleven years old. She was a kindergarten teacher and I was her class monitor. I stood at the end of the line as she took her little ones to the playground, and I helped pick up their blocks and clean the messy jars of finger paint after play period. I loved the time I spent with her. She was beautifully attired, stunningly attractive, and had a knack for making an awkward preteen feel special.
Also the school drama coach, my older friend coaxed me to try out for the role of Ado Annie in Oklahoma!—and ultimately gave me the part. I never could imagine another circumstance under which such a shy young girl would ever find the self-confidence to appear center stage and belt out, “I Can’t Say No.” She told me I could do it and I did. In the audience, my startled parents beamed with pride. From time to time, I still hum the lyrics in the shower and look back at the cast photos in my closet.
Over the years—through junior high school, high school, and college—my favorite teacher sent me lovely handwritten notes and gifts, and I kept her up-to-date about the changes in my life. She invited me to her home and introduced me to her family. When she became a college teacher, I took a graduate education course with her. When I wrote my dissertation, she was by then a full professor and graciously served as one of the advisors on my doctoral committee.
Even during the decade when we lived in different states, I in Maryland and she in New York, we found ways to talk and get together. When I was poised to remarry after my divorce, I asked my mentor how I would know when and if I found Mr. Right. “When you find him, you won’t need to ask,” she counseled wisely with her voice of experience. It was wonderful to have someone to turn to who was so possessed of wisdom and cared about my success.
Without even realizing when the change occurred, “Dr. Dunn” became my dear friend “Rita” and the age gap between us disappeared. Ironically, I live not more than ten miles from her home, so we go to the theater together (we even saw a revival of Oklahoma! on Broadway), celebrate birthday lunches whenever we can, and share dinners with our spouses. I realize how special this friendship is. Without her, I would not be the person I have become. And I know she takes great pride in that as well.
In a similar vein, I read a quirky article in The Charlotte Observer that told a story about an intergenerational friendship with an unusual beginning. Five years ago, a then 17-year-old high school student named Millie received a rambling email from someone she didn’t know. It stated that Harriet and Esther and Tubby were “doing great in a nursing home.”
Perplexed by the message, Millie returned the e-mail to its sender. She soon learned that the email she received was sent, by mistake, by a retired farmer named Bonnie who lived in South Dakota. Yes, it was one of those emails that got lost in cyberspace and wound up in the wrong mailbox—maybe it was providential—but it started a dialogue between two unlikely friends that you might see as an Odd Couple.
This awkward beginning resulted in a close friendship that has lasted for more than five rather eventful years, as young Millie finished four years of college and became an art teacher, and Bonnie’s husband passed away. The two women are fifty-five years apart in age; Bonnie is childless and old enough to be Millie’s grandmother. But as sometimes happens with friendships, the two clicked and found that there was much to share between them. They even