BFF

I talked to Glo last night. We were best friends in high school, and even though she moved to Michigan right after high school, we've kept in touch over the years. Sometimes it's been a year or more between conversations, which it was this time. But the instant we hear each other's voices, we're back in high school.

Glo didn't know Mike died. I got her Christmas card and I realized it's been since last Christmas.

We were on the phone for an hour, laughing and crying about Mike, about the twins she lost more than 30 years ago before care for premature babies consisted of more than cross-your-fingers.

Glo is an oncology nurse. She has sat with many, many people as they've slipped away.

She asked me how old Mike was and I told her. 33.

"Somebody told me right after he died he was the same age as Jesus," I said.

She burst out laughing at the thought of one of my kids being compared to Jesus.

We laughed about the "cancer card" and the "dead kid card"

"Hey, you gotta use what you got," she said.

We talked about airline security being more lax for us as we get older.

"They let me take my crochet hook on the plane," she said. "I think it's the gray hair. They don't see me attacking the pilot with it. It's a kind of profiling I can live with."

She still remembers the story of how my crocheting was confiscated once by an overzealous guard at a courthouse.

I remember the year she came to visit over Thanksgiving. We hadn't seen each other in 12 years and the kids were sure we wouldn't know each other. Of course, we did, and we cried as we hugged.

"If you're so happy, why are you crying?" Michael asked.

"Sometimes you're too happy to laugh," she answered.

"How did you know each other?" Danny asked.

"If you're really lucky, you'll have a best friend you won't forget, no matter what," she said. "And as soon as you're together again, it's like you were never apart."