I am fortunate to still be good friends with a girl I met in Kindergarten, and a girl I met while very lost on the first day of high school.  This year, us  good friends are all turning 30 40, and one of the husbands decided that we should celebrate this fact in Paris. Unfortunately, the fourth good friend in this group (ET) wasn’t able to join us.  She was very missed.

My friends M and S were there for a week with their husbands, but I could only get away for two nights sans Hubby.  But that’s OK, as I was grateful to be able to join them. Did I have a good time? Well, let’s just say I am surprised my butt is still attached to me from all the laughter.

Even though they were sleepless and fatigued from an overseas and overnight flight, they all managed to keep going on that first day right to 10pm.  Maybe it was from the very colourful conversations we had the first few hours in a hotel room, that even made the husbands blush.  We ended the first day with an amazing meal dining Al Fresco in an evening still lit by the sun and warm breezes.  And, my friend S surprised us at the end with an announcement that her generous boss was picking up the tab.  How cool is that?

The next day was spent with us ladies shopping while the Hubbies planned to tour a few museums.  Unfortunately, the museums were both closed, so instead the boyz ate and drank their way through Paris and spent more money on food than my friends did on their purchases! But the smiles on their faces confirmed that they enjoyed their first day there.  In fact, they convinced us to take another ladies only shopping day.  Later when I thanked them for letting me have the girls for two whole days, the one hubby grabbed my elbow and looked me in the eye while saying “No.  Thank YOU”.

In the weeks leading up to the Paris trip, my friends kept asking me if there was anything I wanted to do or see.  The only answer I had was to spend time with them.  I really didn’t care what we were doing, as long as we were together.  What amazed me about my time with them was that it could have been when I was 18, 25 or 33.  Our conversations were completely comfortable and equally shared with the topics ranging from raising children, careers, husbands, parents and waxing.

Our friend S is convinced that our foursome friendship is very similar to the roles of the women in “Sex in the City”.  She is definitely is the role of Samantha, as she can say something out of the blue that makes me cover my eyes and turn beat red every time. And she does this completely deadpan. Our poor friend M, who S thinks is like Charlotte, gasps during S’s descriptive experiences.  After a week with S, I wonder if she will return back to Canada a changed woman.

Living abroad and not having the opportunity to get together with these 3 friends whenever I want to makes me cherish the times I do have with them.  Even though the good-byes are difficult, I know we will pick up again the next time I see them, as if we were only apart a few hours.

I am grateful too, to have known them for so long. They have known me in my teens, my twenties, and my thirties and supported me along the way.  We will
likely be that group of senior ladies on a bus driving to Reno still talking about waxing.  Well, hopefully not destined for Reno but I really don’t care where as long as we are all together.

Does turning 40 bother us? Not really.  We’re still fabulous.