What Girlfriends Bring To Your Life - Femina

I sat under an oak tree on a summer day, drinking iced tea and visiting with my mother. "Don't forget your girlfriends," Mother advised, clinking the ice cubes in her glass. "No matter how much you love your husband, you are still going to need girlfriends. Remember to go places with them now and then; and do things with them, even when you don't necessarily want to... And remember that girlfriends are not only friends, but sisters, daughters, mothers, grandmothers and other relatives too..."

"What a funny piece of advice," I thought. "Hadn't I just gotten married? Hadn't I just joined the couple world? I was now a married woman, for goodness sake, not some young girl who needed friends!"

But I listened to my Mom. I kept in contact with my girlfriends and even found some new ones along the way. I came to understand that Mom really knew what she was talking about!

Here is what I know about girlfriends:

▪ Girlfriends bring you casseroles and scrub your bathroom when you need help.

▪ Girlfriends keep your children and your secrets.

▪ Girlfriends give advice when you ask for it. Sometimes you take it, sometimes you don't.

▪ Girlfriends don't always tell you you're right, but they're usually honest.

▪ Girlfriends still love you, even when they don't agree with your choices.

▪ Girlfriends pull you out of jams.

▪ Girlfriends help you get out of bad relationships.

▪ Girlfriends help you look for a new apartment. Help you pack, then help you move.

▪ Girlfriends will give a party for your son or daughter when they get married or have a baby, no matter in which order that happens!

▪ Girlfriends are there for you, in an instant, when hard times come.

▪ Girlfriends will listen when you lose a job or a friend.

▪ Girlfriends listen when your children break your heart.

▪ Girlfriends listen when your parents' minds and bodies fail.

▪ Girlfriends cry with you when someone you loved dies.

▪ Girlfriends support you when the men in your life let you down.

▪ Girlfriends help you pick up the pieces when men go.

Girlfriends rejoice at what makes you happy and are ready to go out and kill what makes you unhappy. Time passes. Life happens. Distance separates. Children grow up. Marriages fail. Hearts break. Careers end. Jobs come and go. Parents die. Colleagues forget favours. Men don't call when they say they will... But girlfriends are there... no matter how much time and how many miles are between you... A girlfriend is never farther away than needing her can reach.

Wanna Be A Perfect Friend?

Femina Friend Chand Bhatia of Adipur sent us this snippet...

• Treat your friends as you do your pictures and place them in their best light.

• The road to a friend's house is never too long.

•Be a friend to yourself and others will be so too.

•The best time to make friends is before you need them.

•Laughter is the shortest distance between two friends.

•A friend is someone with whom you dare to be yourself.

•A true friend never gets in your way unless you're going down.

•Surround yourself only with people who are going to lift you higher.

•A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though she knows that you are slightly cracked.