The Wahoo Girls

The Wahoo Girls, three of us, are the kinds of friends where the cliche, 'letting our hair down,' is a mild understatement for what happens when we get together. Yes, we're somewhere between Carrie Bradshaw and crew from, "Sex in the City," and the old broads on the "Golden Years," and certainly not "Desperate Housewives." There's lots of wine when we get together, as well as, honest, funny conversations. And since we need so little excuse to eat, drink, and enjoy one another, we used my impending departure as the excuse for yesterday's get together. What's so reassuring about these friendships is how each of us has not forgotten who we had been before becoming mothers. We don't get together to sit around talking about our kids, but instead talk about life and all of the complexities that we encounter. We also don't sit around discussing or dissecting our marriages, not that we couldn't discuss any of our concerns if we had to. It's funny how unspoken this is, our time together extending beyond the parameters of our every day lives. Whenever I leave one of our gatherings, I marvel at how much fun it had been, and how intimate we are with one another. I feel fortunate to have friends where there is so little artifice since artifice, especially in a city like LA, is worn daily, constantly.

Our conversations don't so much as end, but is merely suspended, to be picked up when we get together again. I revel in the fact that we, each of us, recognized in the other, the potential to be a Wahoo Girl. Yes, when we were younger, more adolescent, we were the fun-loving girls, who could always be counted on to liven up any gathering. And believe me, we, collectively, celebrate this aspect of the other. It's rare to meet someone, particularly among women, who is confident enough in themselves to just let it all hang out, as they say. And that is what I love about my Wahoo Girls, the ones I would call in a heartbeat to say, 'hey, get your ass on that plane because I'm bored without my Girls!' Each gathering now is one away from that day when I leave. So, each time we toast our glasses, we don't say it's a toast for my departure, but rather our friendship.