Milestones in life

Today, I received an e-mail from the daughter of one of my oldest friends here in Canada. My friend is about to celebrate her 60th birthday, a milestone some of us have already celebrated, and her daughter is throwing her a surprise party. She is inviting all her Mother's "girlfriends" to a pyjama party overnight. I wish I could attend, but unfortunately I will not be in the Province at the time. Her daughter asked me to send a note to be read out at the party and so I started putting together something that I hoped would be memorable for her of our times together since l974, when we first met.
As I wrote down some of the funny and memorable things that we had done together with out children, who were all very close in age, (both of us had an elder daugher and a younger son, both sons born within 6 weeks of each other in the same hospital!), I realized that I was dredging up memories not only for my friend, but for myself; memories which were were long forgotten or put aside in the daily life I lead. It was a heart-warming experience and I laughed as I remembered some of the funniest things we had done together. We wallpapered her bathroom with yellow and silver foil paper one night - and did not finish until about 2a.m. The children were sleeping together in the spare room. We watched in delight on other days as the girls dressed up from the "Tickle Trunk" in endless costumes and paraphernalia and pranced around in front of us to music from an old record player - usually Jim Croce's "Leroy Brown". One night, my friend and I and 2 other ladies drove the 40 miles to Dawson Creek to see Raveen perform on stage - and hopefully get hypnotized! It was 25 degrees below zero and her car (an old Dodge Dart) had no floorboards in the front. I sat in the front passenger seat over a view of the road flying by underneath me, and froze me feet! (By the way, none of us was able to be hypnotized - we must have all been sceptics!)
These memories made me realize how important it is to relate stories to your children - tell them about your life and your experiences and let them hear about the funny things which happened to you when you were young and inexperienced. Perhaps for my generation, it is more important than ever to relate or story-tell, because we did not have digital photography and video recordings. Our photos from those days are faded and dog-eared now, but the memories are still vibrant and alive!