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Marni Schneider's avatar

Friendship is definitely a spiritual practice for me! And in retirement I've had more time to enjoy it. I play Mahjong twice a week with a few very close friends. When the Covid 'lockdown' began, we quit. That lasted about 3 weeks at which point we decided that our mental/emotional health was at LEAST as important as out physical health and resumed playing twice weekly - which we continue to do. And it's not about the game - it's about our time together, sharing our lives.

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Sally Jane Smith travel author's avatar

We lost my niece in 2019, to a traffic accident in Hanoi.

I've always known she was an exceptional person - one of the most "alive" people I knew, charismatic and caring - but I've been surprised by how many have considered her their best friend.

At first I wondered if this was a perception coloured by their grief. But with the years and my ongoing conversations with these friends of hers, I've realised that she had a quality that genuinely made her a best friend to more than one person - from their perspective, at least. I don't know who she considered her own best friend. I suspect that all of them were deeply important to her in slightly different ways, and that there wasn't a hierarchy. They were all her sisters in spirit.

Maybe there was something similar in your first mom's relationship with these friends of hers?

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