6 July, 2008 | Leave a Comment
Waterloo Sunset: After the Rain
Today is my friend Anita’s 50th birthday. Anita, I wanted to take a photo of a brilliant Waterloo Sunset for you on your birthday — with a bright sky and yellow rays of light. As you can see, Mother Nature offered something slightly more gothic. [I actually went to the bridge last night as well, just as an insurance policy, but the sun was not even visible at all. It may be summer...but this is London!] It had been raining earlier this evening, as you can see, but the storm passed around the time of the sunset. I’ve called this After the Rain, because I think it’s an apt metaphor for what this birthday means for you.
Anita is one of my dearest friends. We met while doing our master’s degrees in creative writing. We are very different — we come from different generations, we’re not the same race, we’ve had different life experiences. In the first years of our friendship, we did not often get along too well. To be honest, I’m surprised we were able to overcome those early disagreements and build the friendship we have now. It’s taken some work, but I’m so glad we stuck together. I’m not an easy person to get to know, but Anita is one of the few people who knows the real me — I let her see a side of me (my vulnerabilities, failures, fears) that I let few other people ever see. What more can I say about our friendship? I think that says it all.
Anita and I have never lived in the same town and we probably never will. This makes me sad. We will never be a part of each other’s daily lives in the traditional way. We’ll never meet regularly for coffee or a movie. I’ll never just drop by her place to chat. I’ve never been to her current home, nor her to mine. (Well, mine isn’t a home, just a room!) Of course we have spent time together in the physical world. If we had never met and hung out late into the night many times during the residency periods of our studies, I don’t think we would have had the foundation upon which to build such a real and lasting friendship. But since graduation we rarely see each other — perhaps twice in the past five years and then only very briefly.
Instead, we have a friendship that is built almost entirely around written communication, mostly email. Each day Anita’s emails fill my inbox. We (and William, of course!) discuss pretty much everything, from the most serious political issues to silly celebrity gossip. At the heart of our friendship is a love of literature and writing and all things literary (and Virginia Woolf!). That is the glue that holds us together. A literary friendship such as this is hard to find, which is one of the reasons I treasure it so.
Though our friendship is possible because of modern technology (okay, sure, we could write letters, but email offers an instantaneous, 24/7 form of communication that is vastly different from letter writing), there is still an old-fashioned quality to having a friendship that is based almost entirely in writing. We don’t exchange lame text messages or use that kind of texting language or slang either. We also rarely chat through Instant Messenger. Instead, we send messages (sometimes long, sometimes short, always frequent) that are thoughtful, that contain ideas or insights or funny observations or links or book recommendations or pleas for advice or a “shoulder” to cry on — all with complete sentences and punctuation. The perfect way for writers to communicate.
Recently we discussed whether we’d be friends if we lived near each other and saw each other all the time. We agreed that we’d be friends, but it’d be different. It certainly wouldn’t be the same friendship and it probably wouldn’t be as meaningful. Though I’d love to see Anita more often, we know we don’t need to spend time together in person. We don’t feel like friends who’ve been separated. We accept this friendship for what it is and all the wonderful things it offers.
So thank you for your friendship, Anita. I’m so glad to have you in my life. I look up to you and admire your courage and determination. I thank you for all the wonderful advice you’ve given me, for the wisdom you’ve shared, for the guidance you give me as I navigate my life. I really don’t know what I’d do without you. Love you much. xoxo
“Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends.”
– Virginia Woolf
London on July 6, 2008
Anglofille said @ 11:30 pm | personal | 7 Comments
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WOW!!! What a beautiful posting!!! Your words about Anita captures every word I feel about her.
She is such a terrific friend, isn’t she? I too cannot imagine my life without her in it!
We are both so lucky to have Anita in our every day lives and being able to share our ups and downs with her!!!
THANK YOU ANITA!!!
(And the photos are fabulous!)
Happy Birthday Anita!!!
With LOTS of love!
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What a beautiful tribute, and a fab pic.
Just curious, what kind of camera do you have, Anglofille?
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Thanks! This is my camera.
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London boy in Kansas Says:
July 8th, 2008 at 2:14 pmer…it’s not the camera.
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Anita Says:
July 8th, 2008 at 6:36 pmI’m at a writing retreat in Lovington, Virginia at a cyber cafe sitting next to two strangers who are strangers to this town, too. I don’t want to cry in front of them. That would be embarrassing, but your post touched me. I am grateful for our friendship, much more than I ever let on. Quite frankly I find it unimaginable what my life would have been like these past 2 years without it. You’ve supported me tremendously. I know it hasn’t always been easy. Rarely is it with me. Thanks for sticking in. Love you much. A
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Anita Says:
July 8th, 2008 at 6:36 pmAnd the photos are lovely.
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Anita, not only are the photos lovely– you are too!
