I’ve belonged to a lunch club in Norwich for the best part of thirty years and I’m still the youngest person there. We’ve all got old together. I’ve never taken age as any factor in friendship; though I first started going to keep my mother company on the way.
Two friends live in the next town, some nine miles away. Sisters, both in their nineties, they gave up driving many years ago when they moved into a town house together after their husbands died, and used to get to the society by bus – two buses, in fact. But I’ve been driving over to them and picking them up for quite a long time. They haven’t been able to come for a while – Jo, the elder sister, broke her femur back in the autumn. They wanted to join us but, when I went to fetch them, they were clearly a bit anxious and Jo suggested crying off at the last. Fortunately, Lilian was firm with her and the day was a success. They feel some ice has been broken, as it were, and now their social life can start again. They had a rather dismal Christmas as their oven went wrong on Christmas Day and they had to have cold ham out of a packet, and they hadn’t got any presents to give each other as they hadn’t been able to go shopping. Of course, someone would have shopped for them but for some reason (probably that they hadn’t asked and no one realised) it hadn’t happened. So I’ve said I’ll pick them up one day, whenever they choose, and drive them into Norwich and carry their parcels and they can shop until we all drop, to make up for lost time. It’ll be fun.
We were also remembering our friend Marian, who started up the club and who died four years ago, at the age of 96. She bought herself an iPad and learned how to use it in her 90s, which I cite as an example to anyone in, let’s say, their 70s, who says they’re too old to learn. It’s about time I learned something new, now I think about it. It’s been a while since I took up a new interest – apart from LT, of course, hem hem.