Once a year, it's just us Gal-only trips can help keep life sane

• Published in: Concord monitor (Concord, N.H. : 1970)
• Main Author: Goldsberry, Ellen
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: Concord, N.H Concord Monitor/Sunday Monitor 30.08.2009

Two other family members soon asked to join us: Aunt Lucille's daughters, whom I hadn't seen in decades. Because they are 13 and 10 years older than I am and grew up 400 miles away, I had little childhood interaction with them. I remembered them as being full of life and a bit exotic: well-traveled, adventurous and worldly about things I didn't begin to understand. We noted personality differences, my sister and younger cousin being irrepressible extroverts, my older cousin and I melting into the wallpaper whenever possible. We realized with surprise that our shared religious and cultural heritage - Swiss Mennonite - formed a surprising bond, though none of us has any ties to a Mennonite church. We spent time deliberating life's biggest challenges (caring for dependents, finding a job with meaning, making a difference in the world) and life's little hassles (finding the perfect handbag, having to cook, needing glasses to read). All these activities created great memories, but as any woman who takes an annual girls' getaway knows, that's not why we get together. Location is only incidental; the four of us would have fun in a dungeon. We get together because we give to each other and take from each other something that we don't get in our everyday lives. A weekend of just good friends - just girls - helps us put our lives in perspective, grounds us and makes us once again thankful for lifelong, female friends.