This is Noni and I in our minds. Ahem. The truth is we’re grandmothers in our 60’s but girls can dream!
I am late here today because today was a Sunday With Noni, my favorite time of the week, well, besides Saturday night, and now Fridays, and sometimes Sunday nights too! She has been a miracle in my life. Some of you know about my sweet friendship with Noni, many won’t, and I tell you this, especially if you are older, and sometimes lonely, that if you just reach out to someone miracles can occur.
I have had such a very hard time for years, living alone, and lonely, BUT one day I got a bee in my bonnet. I don’t know where I got the courage — I mean I’d known Noni for many years but it was a friendship that never really fully blossomed — and what it turned into was like nothing I ever knew was possible.
One day in July of 2016 I had just had enough. Weekends were always harder somehow, even though I rarely left the house and nothing really changed on the weekends on the weekends no one was in their normal place, the Monday to Friday weekly routine that everyone establishes in their own way, even if they are at home all the time, changes. There is no structure like there is during the week and I dreaded Fridays coming and was relieved when it was Monday again. People went back to work or school, regular t.v. programs were on (I still had cable t.v. then which I never watched much but it was company for me at night) that were not on over the weekend, and I was always lost. The hours seemed endless. So one day I got the abovesaid bee in my bonnet and I called Noni and I asked her if she would like to come over the coming Saturday and cook dinner with me? She said yes. I was excited but scared. And then I/we proceeded to have one of the best weekends ever. We did elaborate cooking with the intent to cook more than we needed so we would have leftovers for the week ahead. We put on music on Pandora, and we drank wine and danced in the kitchen! It was so much fun! That first night, as we were finishing our delicious dinner, I looked at Noni and said, “I’ve just had the BEST time! I wish we could do it every Saturday!” And she looked straight at me, raised her glass and said, “Let’s!” And we’ve been doing it almost every single Saturday for over a year now, except when we have family obligations or she goes out of town which isn’t very often.
We went on like this for awhile and had so much fun, looking forward to every Saturday. We would choose recipes together, divide up the ingredients we needed and each buy some of them, and we would cook and eat and listen to music and dance sometimes and watch a movie after dinner. It was absolutely lovely. Weekend evenings were “free” times for Noni because she is raising her grand-daughter Kyra but Kyra is with her grandfather or mother over the weekend. Noni works during the day on Friday and Saturday and Sunday afternoons so the weekend was a perfect time for her to have some time on her own and for me the bliss of a friend to make and eat dinner with.
Came the day that I looked in my freezer which was full of food because I had gotten, after the fire, on a program of buying mainly meats online and yet I seldom was inspired to cook much for myself. I called her and said, “Noni, we do our big cooking on Saturday night but you have to work all day on Friday and I have a freezer full of food that needs to be eaten. Do you want to come over and we can just pull something out of the freezer and throw a simple, quick dinner together?” And she said YES! And our Friday routine was born. And then since she didn’t have her grand-daughter on the weekends and came over for our big cooking night on Saturday and our cooking tended to be a big affair and took time and what with having wine and a movie after and it getting late I asked her if she’d just like to stay over because I have a darling little guest room that no one ever uses. And she said YES! She didn’t have to be to work until 1 on Sundays so we started getting up on Sunday morning, I would make us coffee, and we would sit at the kitchen table and have coffee and talk — you know, about everything! our kids and the grandkids and world issues! — and there was just something SO special about having had such a wonderful time on Saturday night and then getting up and having coffee together Sunday mornings, with our funny morning hair and in our jammies, and the pugs jumping around. And EVENTUALLY she started coming back for dinner on Sunday evenings, just because, and then she would go get her sweet Kyra and they would head on into their week ahead and I would have had the BEST WEEKEND EVER!!! It changed my life. It changed BOTH of our lives, and now, we grandmothers whose children are grown and into their own lives, who formerly spent the weekends alone, are doing it up big time.
Now we both buy things at Costco, say, and split the cost of things, the meats, big packages of toilet paper, all kinds of things. We are now more family than just friends, and I love her kids and she loves mine and it’s lovely to watch our children grow and interact with them and then talk it over with each other. And somehow there is just something SO special about Sunday mornings together, having coffee, maybe some biscotti with it, hanging out, maybe playing cards. I just love the whole weekends together but Sunday morning with Noni is very special.
And THIS weekend was very special because today is Noni’s birthday! And her car broke down and is in the shop so yesterday afternoon I picked her up from work at 4 and we went by her house so she could pick up the things she needed and we came here and cooked and ate AND we watched the last 4 episodes of Downton Abbey! We’ve been watching the whole series for sometime. We watch all kinds of things. We are MAD about Grace and Frankie! I got her a coconut cream pie for her birthday because she loves it and I got smiley face candles, 6 little ones, from the Dollar Store, and we had pie last night to start celebrating early and she had pie with her coffee this morning! She will of course be spending her birthday evening with her kids, but I took her to work today and came home and now here I am! Another wonderful weekend with my darling Noni, and today was Sunday Coffee With Noni!
I could never have dreamed what that one little scared dinner invitation would grow into, it is the most special friendship of my life, we are now more like sisters than friends, she is Auntie Noni to the pugs! and she does things like reorganize everything in my house so that I can’t find anything! Ha! Our weekends are such lovely happy times, I hope they go on and on. But for today it was Sunday Coffee With Noni and Happy Birthday Noni Macaroni!!! I love you!
If you are lonely, reach out to someone, it can change your life!
The Experiment ~A 365 Day Search For Truth, Beauty &
Happiness: Day 1 ~ Introduction To The Project
“Do or do not. There is no try.”
Yoda
Perhaps the most delightful friendships are those in which there is much agreement, much disputation, and yet more personal liking.
George Eliot (1819-1880)
It’s lovely to read about your an Nonis weekends!
Margaretha
Thank you so much darling Margaretha! They are marvelous indeed. I loved getting your note yesterday and will answer you this evening. I’m about to take a nap with the pugs! I hope you have had a beautiful day and thanks for the Eliot quote, how wonderful!
Love to you sweet friend…
Maitri
That sounds like such fun! Your joy jumps right off the page… Happy birthday, Noni! x
Thank you so much Jenny, yes, joy indeed. In the worst of times during these last several months of serious depression the only time I really lit UP was when Noni was here. It is not only a great and beautiful thing but has saved me more often than I can tell you. And I will pass your birthday wishes on to her. She will be delighted! 😀
How wonderful! What a happy post and I’m very pleased for you that you’ve found such a fantastic friend. Everyone should be so lucky! Thanks for sharing 🙂
Thanks so much Sal! Yes, it IS a happy post and it felt good to write it. When one struggles and suffers from depression for much of their life they can forget that there are truly wonderful and beautiful things, so many, to be grateful for. This year long journey here, on the blog, I hope will seat me more firmly in my joy so that when the dark times come, and they will, they will be easier to bear and I will never forget how much there is in the world to be thankful for. Thank you for being here. It’s so nice to see you and I love your artwork! 😀
What a wonderfully happy story and even more so because it’s true. Friendship is wonderful. Happy Birthday Noni!
Thank you so much Tori, and yes, friendship is one of the most radiant gems in our life. I am deeply blessed to have Noni in my life, I am grateful for her presence in my life every single day. I will make sure she sees your sweet birthday wishes too! 😀
It’s delightful to read that you are still having your weekend social time with Noni. I also treasure time spent with my friends.
One of my happy moments today was a little thing, but very pleasant nonetheless. I just got a glucose meter and was having trouble operating it. I took it in to the pharmacy and the pharmacist was just so pleasant, helpful and nonjudgmental about me not being able to figure it out. He even joked that I must have wanted to come back to see them today. I left with a smile on my face and wishing them a good day.
Thank you so much Joan, yes, it is wonderful to have these weekends with Noni, I am so glad that you have your good times with friends too. And YES what a wonderful story about the pharmacist! I’m so glad that you shared it with me. I have found out only late in my life how fabulous pharmacists are and how MUCH they know. Very often, as I’ve been told and found out, they know MORE than many doctors about drug interractions and such. I’m so glad you had such a wonderful experience. Thank you for coming here and sharing it with me honey.
Love and blessings to you, and love that grandbaby!!! 😀
Loneliness is such a downer, and friendship such an upper.
congrats to both you and noni for having these very special “girlfriend infusion”
weekends. your joy and pleasure are palpable. you might consider having a photo of Noni you can have up in the kitchen and/or on your desk, to remind you she is always with you (kinda like jesus, but even better, if that’s not too heretical)
xo
ka
Thanks so much Ka and yes, I’d like to get a picture of Noni and I having fun in the kitchen to remind me of our good times, that would be a lovely thing to have. And I don’t think Jesus would mind! 😀
At least you reached out. You had the courage and you did it!!!
Yes Marge and you’ve no idea how hard it was for me to ask that first time, or how many many years I was so achingly lonely I didn’t know how I’d get through it, but I did ask, and she does come. And I do better from Sunday night to Friday night when Noni comes again because even if I get lonely through the week just knowing that she will be coming helps me so much. One never knows what might happen if, even though they are afraid, they ask… 🙂
I am so happy for you to have Noni in your life. When you live alone like I do, weekends can indeed be hard to get through… I am not blessed with a friend like Noni, but I do enjoy saturdays with my brother… spending most of the time gardening together… happy birthday to Noni… and many more happy weekends to come! ❤️❤️❤️
Thank you so much Claudine honey, I envy you having a brother and sister close by that you see regularly. That is lovely. I was an only child and my parents and grandparents are gone so there’s no one of my generation or older to talk to that remembers how things were. Noni and I were just talking about that today. She is lucky, both of her parents are alive, in their 80’s, and very active, and though they don’t live here Noni is very close to them. So we all have different things in our lives I suppose. I am very grateful to have Noni and I am very grateful to have YOU! I love you sweet pea. Thanks for writing here this evening honey… 🙂
Oh Maitri, this just makes me so happy and hopeful 🙂
It’s been a rough while for me, but you inspire me everyday, and maybe I can reach out to someone too!
Happy Birthday Noni!
Love and hugs from Canada xo
Hello Darling Deana… oh honey, you have been so much in my mind and as always are in my thoughts and prayers. And you make ME feel hopeful and happy too with this post of yours. I so need to find my way to be happy, or as happy as I can be in this life, and I want SO much for others to come along on the journey and find their happiness too. At least we can find and share happy moments with one another here, that is my greatest wish with this project. I will tell Noni that you wished her Happy Birthday and I know we’ll both be sending you love and hugs all the way from Wilmington, NC to Canada! 🙂
Sisterhood ROCKS! 🙂
Today my happy was returning to a women’s circle I have been a part of, but haven’t been attending very much through my caregiving adventures. It was fabulous to just sit in the circle and soak up the energy. I feel recharged…and that’s why I’m a bit late in posting today.
Birthday Blessings to Noni and may you both celebrate many more, in Sisterhood!
Yes indeed Victoria!!!! Sisterhood does indeed ROCK!!!! 😀
And I am SO happy that you went to the women’s circle! Isn’t a woman’s circle the most fabulous experience? I’ve had them online and I’d love to figure out how to do another one some day because so many women feel cut off and alone and don’t have the ability to attend one in their area or there just ISN’T one in their area. For all the bad things that are said about the internet and social media I will be forever grateful for it because it is my lifeline, my connection to the world, and we are able to make dear sister-friends all over the world in this medium, as you and I have found together.
I love you sweet Victoria, again, I’m so glad that you went and feel recharged, that IS something to feel happy about! Carry on sister!
Sunday (and more) with Noni is absolutely the best, best, best kind of happiness – regular, uncomplicated, comfortable, joyous, shared. This is a fabulous post that makes me beam to read it.
Oh thank you so much Cathryn! Yes, it is a wonderful thing to have in my life and it was lovely and sweet to write about. I’ve written about Noni here on the blog before but when I take time to write it all out, how it all began, how scared I was to ask her to come and how delighted I was that she came and how deeply it has enriched my life as we carry on together, well it’s a wonderful thing to stop and recall and appreciate all over again. And you made me so happy when you said it made you beam to read it. Thank you so much for sharing that with me…
Oh Maitri, this is so sweet.! You and Noni cooking and enjoying tv together. I am glad you have her in your life. I feel the same way about weekends too. <3
Sweet Jean, thank you so much, it is a lovely thing indeed and I am deeply grateful that she is in my life. And yes, weekends. They can be so hard, and from time to time Noni can’t be here because she is out of town or her out of town family is in town, and I am lost over the weekend, they can be so hard. We just need to keep trying to find ways to make lonely weekends more bearable. I am sending you love and a gentle, warm hug. I’ll look forward to seeing you here again soon… 🙂