The Catskill Chronicle

By Janet Waterston

My dear friend Terry proposed topics for discussion in advance of our meetings. “Next time we get together,” Terry said, “I’d like to talk about friends we’ve lost.” He added, “Not people who’ve died or those with whom we had a falling out. Friends that somehow slipped through our fingers and out of our lives.”

The subject took on new meaning for me after Terry’s unexpected death only a few months after he suggested that conversation. The hole his death created seemed a bottomless pit.

My thoughts went back to our conversation about friends we’d lost, and Stella came immediately to mind. She and I had met in our second year of grad school when we were both doing internships at the League for the Hard of Hearing. Stella initiated the friendship that quickly bloomed into one of those special ties despite being so different from each other. She was a born-again  Christian; I was, at best, ethnically but not religiously Jewish. She was from Nova Scotia and referred to herself as “the ice queen,” perhaps reflecting our northern neighbor’s reticence. I lived my entire life in New York and could be a bit loud and quick to express myself. I certainly demonstrated none of Stella’s restraint.

Over the years, we shared experiences and ideas. Our phone calls frequently included recommendations on books, and our visits were filled with confidences and laughter. I was a witness to her career, marriage, and the subsequent decision to have children. I drove up to their home outside Boston; Stella came down to New York; and I even spent a vacation with her family in Nova Scotia. We were so close that when she was pregnant with her first child, she teasingly asked me if I’d adopt it if it was a boy since her heart was set on a girl. After Stella gave birth, I started a tradition of sending her daughter a Christmas tree ornament, some of which I made, so she’d have her own collection when she went off to college.

Little by little, visits became more difficult to arrange and the time between calls stretched and stretched. Finally it reached a year without any contact. Even the obligatory birthday card and Christmas letter didn’t arrive.

After Terry’s death, I could not face mourning the loss of two friendships. I wrote Stella a letter. “Did I do something wrong?” I asked. “I would never, never want to hurt you.”

Her phone call was almost immediate. No, of course I’d done nothing. She loved me still. It was just that the more time that went by, the more embarrassed she became about her tardy responses. We vowed to make an effort to stay better in touch.

But the year’s hiatus had taken its toll; I’d been hurt by her silence and was hesitant to throw myself wholeheartedly into a friendship that might, again, disappear. I adopted new expectations. I told myself that as long as the quality of the calls remained the same, their frequency didn’t matter. Over the next several years we managed a couple of visits and called — not too often — and still suggested books and caught each other up on the minutia of our lives and those of our families.

I left a couple of messages at the beginning of last year, and Stella returned my calls mid-March. I apologized for sounding unenthusiastic and explained that my brother’s multiple myeloma had returned with a vengeance. No treatment was working, and it looked like we were facing the end.

Buzz died on April 2. A month and a half later, Stella called. I shared my “news,” and she responded, “You should have called me.” Without thinking or choosing my words, my heart spoke for me, “You should have called.”

Stella offered explanations. She hadn’t realized how bad it was. She didn’t remember me saying he might die. I don’t recall what other points she made, and I was sorry to have put her on the spot. “Let’s move on,” I said, “I know you love me and I love you. I just needed you to know that I could have used your support in those last few weeks.”

“I can’t move on,” Stella replied and, it appears, she hasn’t moved on. We are, once again, not in touch.

“We have friends for reasons, seasons, or a lifetime,” someone told me when I recounted what had transpired with Stella. I guess I have to accept that Stella and I were lucky to have two seasons, not just one.

Cindy was someone I met in our Temple religious school when we were in the eighth grade. Her friendship was a gift. My family had just moved from Long Island to Queens, and I was lonely for my best friend and anxious to belong. With Cindy, I taught music classes in our synagogue; sang in a quartet at the local VA and in two choirs; and shared a subscription series to see dance troupes from around the world. Together, we went on retreats and seminars through the Long Island Association of Temple Youth (LIFTY). As we grew older, I visited her at Brandeis and stood as her maid of honor at her wedding. We kept up a correspondence when she moved across the country and visited whenever she came to see her mother in New York. I was surprised, then, when she moved back to the east coast and the contacts diminished until we were no longer in each other’s lives. Years passed. Cindy called and told me she’d been inspired to reach out to me after attending a LIFTY reunion. “I almost tracked you down before the reunion…” she added and let her voice trail off without an explanation of why she hadn’t. I felt a slight twinge, a small regret that I hadn’t known about the reunion. We agreed to meet in a diner located somewhere between our two homes. “How will we recognize each other?” I teased. She said, “I don’t know. Maybe you’ve changed and will be wearing a fur coat.” What an odd response. Did she think my values could have changed that much?

In the diner, I admitted I’d been nervous about getting together after so long. Cindy acknowledged that she had felt the same way. She continued, “I wasn’t very nice to you when we were supposedly friends.” Though I have no memory of her being anything but wonderful, I felt her behavior at our “reunion” left something to be desired. We saw each other that once and never since. A friend for a reason? To fill my need to belong when I moved to Queens?

Paula was in my life from the very start. She and I were the middle children (and the older daughters) of mothers who became tight friends while living in “the projects” in East New York. The projects were housing for former veterans and their families. My family eventually moved to Deer Park on Long Island, and Paula’s family followed suit. It was a great arrangement. The oldest children, Joel and my brother Buzz, were friends, and the youngest, Linda and Jude, were playmates, but mostly because they got dragged along when Paula and I did anything.

And Paula and I did almost everything together. In the fourth grade when we were given an opportunity to learn an instrument, Paula announced we should play the clarinet. I, not knowing one instrument from another, went right along with her suggestion which I shared with my parents. I’m sure my mother and Nettie, Paula’s mother, spoke, and they did sign us up to learn an instrument. Paula studied flute, and I learned the French horn. Interestingly, our little sisters, when it was their turn, did the opposite, with Linda taking up the horn and Jude attempting the flute as well as the cello and clarinet, all for about 10 minutes.

Paula and I went to the same sleep-away Y camp where we were allowed to choose just one bunkmate: each other, of course. The following summer, before returning to Wiquanuppek in August, we founded our own day camp for the pre-schoolers in our neighborhood, thus launching our babysitting  careers. During the school year, we were editors of the newspaper; participated in art club; and played in band.

When my family moved to Queens, I was heartbroken to be parted from my best friend. We got to see each other when our mothers drove to some midpoint between Suffolk and Queens Counties. Paula and I got out of the cars and discovered we were dressed almost identically in the then popular off-white tennis sweaters with V-necks framed by a band of navy and one of cranberry. I wore a navy skirt and Paula wore one in cranberry.

When we outgrew the Y camp, we went to a summer program for high school music students at the University of Vermont. Paula and I were roommates. The following summer, we were junior counselors at yet another Y camp, this one outside Port Jervis. Like our brothers who both went to Binghamton, Paula and I went off to SUNY colleges, but I went to Albany and she went to Buffalo. Paula’s aunt and family lived near Albany and hosted me for some lovely home-made meals and evenings in a family environment. If I was a friend of Paula’s, I was welcome in their home.

Despite several moves, we kept in touch through visits, calls, and letters. As we got further from childhood and our lives became more complicated, the time between contacts grew.

At Paula’s wedding, I was reunited with her Albany relatives and, of course, Paula’s parents and siblings. My mother had died, but my father was there and seated with Paula’s family. I was seated at the table furthest from the bride and groom: the one of odds and ends of friends who don’t seem to go with any particular group. Paula introduced me to my table mates as “the person who did the calligraphy on the invitations.” I thought my claim to fame was being her oldest friend, her childhood best friend. Her lifetime friend.

I received a thank you note for my wedding gift and acknowledging me, again, for the calligraphy. We never saw each other or spoke after that. No reason that I know of. We just lost each other. I think Paula should have been a friend for a lifetime. Could I reach out? Should I? After my experience with Stella, I am afraid to try.

It seemed safer to reach out to Katie. Kate was Jude’s childhood best friend and, in time, became a close friend of mine. Kate and Jude traveled to Europe together after graduating high school, and one summer, when I had an apartment to myself, Kate moved in with me. After she moved to California, I visited a few times while on business trips, and Jude and I visited together.

The east coast/west coast time difference is a challenge and, again, family and work obligations seemed to stretch the time between phone calls. At the end of each, we’d vow to be better at keeping in touch, but our resolve didn’t amount to much.

Jude and I thought often of our last phone call with Katie. It was 2008, just after our father had a stroke. Katie showed the concern and love that she has always demonstrated but neither calls nor written correspondence followed from her or from us. Our year went downhill with Jude, our brother, and I each dealing with our own cancers. Katie’s life was probably equally hectic with her elderly parents’ move out to California; her career as an attorney; and her daughters heading off to college.

Frequently, Jude or I would acknowledge missing Katie and think about calling. Finally we did it. Noon our time; 9:00 in her morning. Katie sounded exactly the same. We caught each other up on the last five years and the flow of information and love was as strong as if we’d spoken the day before. By the end of the call, Katie said she’d e-mail pictures of her daughters, and we said we’d e-mail pictures of our home in the Catskills. We agreed that it isn’t such a big deal to e-mail or call once a month, and I looked forward to welcoming this friend back into my life.

The e-mail with pictures of Katie’s daughters went astray. Perhaps the e-mail addresses we shared were incorrect. Perhaps you can’t go back and there really is no Lost & Found for friends. Or friends just have to be treasured for however long they’re around — for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.