Remembering That

“Toy land. Toy land. Little girl and boy land. While you dwell within it, You are ever happy then.

“Childhood’s joy-land. Mystic merry Toy land, Once you pass it’s borders,

“You can never return again.”

All familiar chants sung by Joan and I while walking the two blocks to St. Paul the Apostle School on 61st Stret

An email the other morning from my inspirational friend resurrected those familiar words.

I smiled remembering how both of us scorned the oft quoted Toyland words.

Neither Joan nor I could wait to leave childhood, and “grow up.”

We knew then we would wear silk stockings and high heels along with Revlon Fire and Ice lipstick and of course, most importantly, find the Princes promised in fairytales

Well, all three happened,

Ironically, our Princes were quite alike in many ways, most importantly in providing the quality of love and life that my friend and I both were blessed to realize,

Today I only remember our anxiety to leave childhood and emerge without delay into the unknown but tempting pool of another session of life on this amazing earth.

Alhough Joan and I are a year apart, it matters not who is the elder.

We are now both dramatically far from the innocence of “boy and girl land”

While our life paths were divided by geography, both remained significantly similar.

My beloved, Prince Arthur, and I had four children.

Joan and her beloved, also a Prince called Arthur, were blessed with five.

Both men had similar educational backgrounds , and grew up far from our Hells Kitchen streets.

Three decades later, in The Putney Inn, a small restaurant nestled in The Northeast Kingdom, our paths crossed again and friendship robustly resurrected.

Sadly, Joan and I were allowed only a brief time to resume the newly shared friendship. Soon afterwards both beloved Princes were called home in the unseen fading sunset,

When both our nights darkened, Joan, despite her sorrow, set the standard for returning to life alone.

She still reinforces my often faltering steps weekly with her never fading joie de vivre.

And although again separated by miles, I am constantly bolstered by her reminder reinforcing the memory of two little girls who believed

“We can do it!”

And remembering that we did.