Our Story: Part 5

In honor of this final day of Women’s History Month in 2024, I would like to share more of our friendship history; a history of two women that spans more than four decades and relocations to new states and a different country.

People are sometimes surprised that the friendship between me and Sara has not only endured, but grown over the years. As we’ve shared in past editions of ‘Our Story,’ fate and seemingly random decisions brought us together, but it was intentional acts to stay connected that kept us close once we took up residence in states nearly 1,000 miles apart.

I was reminded of the important decisions that make friendships stick when reading an article in The Washington Post last month, sharing the story of sixteen women who became friends as students at the University of Maryland in the early 1970s. December marked the 50th year of annual gatherings of this group known as The Sugar Hill Sisterhood, and the article shares some of their tricks for staying close: “A daily WhatsApp group chat helps them stay in touch, as do phone calls, video chats and remote group activities like a 90-day fitness challenge.”

Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive.

Anaïs Nin

These women bonded over being black, female college students in a campus where that was uncommon. Sara and I bonded over identifying as Kentuckians on our respective college campuses, then in Germany and finally in New York, where hailing from Kentucky was often met with surprise and then questions about our horseback-riding abilities.

When I moved from New York City to Chicago in mid-1994 to attend graduate school at the University of Chicago, I was moving away from a friendship with Sara that had deepened thanks to proximity and many shared experiences in both Germany and NYC. I was excited to embark on the next chapter of my life, and relieved that Sara was happy for an excuse to visit the city she called home during her college years.

My first year as an MBA student passed quickly, and I found myself back on the East Coast for a summer marketing internship with the M&M Mars company. Sara was wrapping up her time in New York, having decided to attend graduate school on the same campus near Boston where I spent my college years. The proximity that summer made getting together easier, and we were determined to stay close as she began her graduate studies.

When Sara started at Tufts that fall, I was grateful that she’d chosen to study in a city that I regularly visited to see family. I never would have guessed that our respective decisions to move to new cities for two-year graduate programs would land us in the geographies we’ve now been living in for nearly 30 years. And much as we leaned on each other for support while navigating life in Germany, we did the same in graduate school. Choosing career paths and boyfriends with potential to shape our futures.

As my career prospects came into focus with a job offer and many invitations for interviews at many top brand marketing companies, I embraced the dating scene during my second year at UChicago. While Sara may have needed a spreadsheet to keep up with the new friends I was making, I started to hear more about this nice, funny guy from New Jersey named Jason.

Jason was tall and lean, and as a Duke alumnus, loved college basketball as much as any self-respecting Kentuckian. Sara fell for him, and she was starting to picture a future with him. The fact that Jason was also Jewish didn’t hurt, but she was concerned about the culture gap between his more conservative-leaning family and the reform Judaism she had grown up with.

A summer visit with Jason to meet his parents sealed their fate when Sara pointed out an unusual mole on Jason’s back that she thought he wasn’t taking seriously enough. When a biopsy later revealed melanoma, Sara was by his side for his recovery. Their graduation in May of 1997 was followed a few months later by their wedding. That’s when I first met Sara’s close college friend Marci, my fellow Chuppah holder, who would become a friend I came to cherish over time as well. 

As I settled into my marketing career at the Quaker Oats company in Chicago, Sara and Jason moved into their first home as a married couple in downtown Boston, soon followed by a move to a modest ranch house in the suburbs that would be transformed by two renovations into the beautiful home they still live in with their youngest son and dog Winnie.  I spent my late 20s and early 30s moving between apartment rentals and different Quaker brands, yet our divergent lifestyles never impacted our friendship. Sara was always a great listener, and even as a new parent made time for meet-ups in Chicago, Boston, Kentucky or elsewhere for a new adventure.

As my early 30s became my mid-30s, I would soon be joining Sara in matrimony, and then parenthood. But that’s a story for another day…