The Halifax Life Girls Reunion

“Sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence. A time to let go and allow people to hurl themselves into their own destiny. And a time to prepare to pick up the pieces when it's all over.”
- Gloria Naylor

Twenty three years ago I worked at a small life insurance company called Halifax Life. It was an interesting company staffed by a hundred people, most of them young. Our president and vice president were in their thirties. There was a group of women, all single (except one) and all in our late twenties and early thirties. We were smart and pretty professionals with bright hopes and promising futures. We used to lunch together and share stories of romances and adventures. The last time I was with them all, was at my wedding. Most of us lost touch in the years of marriage and children.

My friend Gail is one of the women I met at Halifax Life. Over these twenty-three years, Gail went on to become one of my dearest friends. We share family holidays and spa days. We sit on the Board of West Toronto Community Legal Services together. It was after a recent Board meeting that we began talking about our days at Halifax Life and the women who made up our group. And we decided to try and reunite the gang for a Halifax Life Girls Reunion Dinner.

Gail contacted Julie who she remains in touch with. I found Cecilia and Colleen. We have no idea how to contact Lorrie who moved to England more than twenty years ago. We are all married now except the only one of us who was married in our original group - she is now single. In a couple of weeks, we will meet and get caught up on the years which have passed in a blur.

Part of me thinks I should send them a picture so they don't have to work, not to register on their faces, the surprise of seeing me as an over-weight middle-aged woman. Julie has seen me recently so no concern there but Colleen and Cecilia have not. Of course, they too are now middle-aged but I expect they are as trim and lovely as they were all those years ago. Of course it really won't matter. I don't think it will take long until all our eyes see past the extra pounds, wrinkles and changes of these last years and look straight into the hearts of the lovely young women we still are.