Beyond boundaries

We sat across each other in the usually filled-up tables of  Lemon Grass. It was refreshing to sit and dine with a long missed friend after what – three? five? years?  Short conversations between morsels, we always loved to eat.  Perhaps that’s the reason for our increased waistlines.  But no matter, between old friends, figures are trivial compared to the wealth of experiences that needed to be shared and the relief of stress that only could be vented on food.

Maria Paloma Alburo-Sandiego is back albeit for a short while.  Pal was our previous business editor at The Freeman.  And sometimes, when my present editor, Joefel Banzon patiently reminds me of my column, I attribute her fortitude to the legacy of Pal.

The ambivalence of my friend has remained.  The zest lay beneath the subtle reference to her career in a new land.  The melancholia that would slip once in a while between laughter and teasing, that showed how she missed her family, her friends and her homeland. 

It is amazing how friendship takes on a large part of our lives.  How we, without realizing have actually relied a lot on our pals for survival.  We call on them for company, for comfort, for complains.  Pal’s nickname has come in as a true emblem of what she is.

Maintaining friends takes the basic ingredient of wavelengths and understanding.  It’s like a marriage without the physical passion, undistorted by sex.  It is like a business that grows with dependability and concern.  Distance and time are not so much a requirement as in matrimony.  And  its strength and depth comes to test in moments where no gaps seem to have layered the chasm of absence.  Absence in this case, does not really make the heart grow fonder.  It just continues to connect.

It was nice to meet an old friend who has not allowed years to cross her face, and who has never grown old in my heart.  Welcome home Pal.  The world of friendship has made distance go beyond boundaries.