Nothing like a little "Group Therapy" to make things right in your world. "Group Therapy" is the name that my girlfriends and I have dubbed our group. We came together in crisis and formed a friendship that supersedes time, distance and events. We met in Lancaster as we all worked for the school district there. Three of us became new principals at the same time and we stumbled our way through our first year with many phone calls, emails and after hours dinners and drinks. One member was our special programs director and we would not have made it without her constant vigilance and help. The fifth member of our party joined us a bit later in the role of public relations director or some such nonsense that didn't even begin to explain her duties or her importance to us. If the musketeers could have five instead of three...that would be us.
When I say that our relationship stretches beyond the boundaries that would eradicate normal relationships I am not exaggerating. We have, through the years, supported each other through the deaths of parents and siblings, the diagnoses of cancer for two of our children, the marriages and divorces and remarriages of some of our children, the births of our grandchildren, the changes of jobs and relocation for some of our members, the retirements of two of us and the marriage of one of us. We have shared such times of joy and heartache, in equal doses it seems, that we are forged together. When one has joy we all celebrate. When one hurts, we all cry and pray. That is who we are. That is why we dubbed our group...Group Therapy.
The hectic pace of our individual lives caused us to allow time to slip away and before we knew it, we had not gotten together as a group for almost three years. During that time various ones of us would see each other and we continued to email but we didn't MAKE TIME for each other or for ourselves. No more!! We have decided as a group that we WILL get together quarterly and we will wallow in our time together and relish each precious moment. Four of us were able to get together in February and at that time we rather ambitiously decided that we would get together monthly. We have rethought that. We will, however, get together quarterly with each person in turn playing hostess and planning the therapy session.
I took my turn this weekend! What fun we had!! To begin with, I made reservations for the five of us at the Hyatt Garland on George Bush. We come from all different cities (Rockwall, Odessa, Lancaster, Ennis and Frisco)so this seemed like a good location and central to the activities I had planned. The hotel was very nice and the personnel were very accommodating. Since we had a full afternoon and evening planned we arrived at the hotel at noon, three hours before check-in, and the staff didn't bat an eyelash at securing our luggage and finding a refrigerator for our snacks! After dropping of our belongs we headed out for lunch...Pei Wei at Firewheel Center. Yummy!
Carol, JoDell, Jeanne, Prissy and Delia
After our delicious lunch we headed to D'Vine Wine so that I could purchase my favorite cranberry shiraz to share with the girls later. We also wanted to look at their painted wine glasses because that was the project for the evening once we returned to the hotel.
Next we headed out to stroll through the Dallas Arboretum. Dallas Blooms was going on and even though we had a recent incident with snow in late March, the dogwoods, the forsythia, the tulips...it was all incredibly beautiful. While there we had our picture made together for a future therapy session. We are going to a winery to make our own wine with our personalized label!
The Girls at the Arboretum
After the Arboretum we made our way to Mockingbird Station and had dinner at Margarita Ranch. This is, without a doubt, my FAVORITE Mexican food place. It has a kitchy little bar feel and their spinach and mushroom enchiladas with green sauce are to die for! When you put your "favorite" out there for people you can lead to some pretty high expectations and possible disappointment. I wanted my friends to love MR as much as I do. I'm pretty sure they did. We were there for three and a half hours. Appetizers, dinner and margaritas by the pitcher! Maybe the three pitchers of margaritas influenced their decision, but I don't think so.
After MR, as if we hadn't stuffed ourselves enough, we went to Stone Cold Creamery for some delicious ice cream. While there some young man in a convertible kept driving by, honking and yelling to us. I'm sure that he had never seen such a bevy of beauties and just didn't know how to contain himself. Probably thought, "Let me give the old broads a thrill to talk about for months!" Little did he know we are tech savvy and he would merit a place in a blog!!
Ice cream finished we headed back to the hotel where we took up our project and painted glasses. Two painted wine glasses, two painted martini glasses and one painted a water glass/vase. We giggled, made fun of our own efforts, one of us (okay, me) splattered painted all over her new jammies and face. Don't ask how. We had a great time. About midnight we headed off to bed.
You know you are true friends when you don't complain about your sleeping mates ridiculous snoring and fidgeting (okay, me again). We slept the night away and awoke to a beautiful, if somewhat brisk, Sunday morning.
Breakfast at IHOP and our therapy session was done...until June. I can hardly wait to see what Jeanne has in store for us.
Prissy, I love you. What can I say. Thanks for putting up with my fidgeting and snoring. Thanks for sleeping with me...in a good way. Thanks for always being there for me when I can't manage to pull it together. You are my sister at heart.
Jo, I always come away from our get-togethers amazed by your strength of character and how you are so involved in your own health and don't just rock along with whatever the doctor says. You are an amazing woman and I am certain that someone of the male persuasion is going to recognize that in you. They have no idea what they are missing!
Jeanne, I am so impressed with your dedication to making education beneficial for all the stakeholders...even though you "retired." You are still in there trying to help administrators help their teachers and their students. Bless you, my friend.
Delia, I can't go three years between get-togethers with you. I miss you, my sister. You are such a skilled and beautiful person that my prayer is that towards the end of Tommy's working career you will both find yourselves back in this area where we can have our "De time," too.
