Having lost my beautiful, special friend to cancer last week, today I felt a walk in the rain was ap

Having lost my beautiful, special friend to cancer last week, today I felt a walk in the rain was appropriate...

I think we develop special friendships at different times of our lives. One of those poignant times is when you have your first child. This is when Joelle and I met, at an aqua-natal group where my son was still under wraps and she’d just given birth to her daughter. After my son was born we embarked together on our own little ‘mummy boot camp’, neither of us had any experience of babies so we laughed, got confused and discovered the wonders of wet wipes together.

Today’s walk in the rain helped me to reminisce on how most days she would call and enthusiastically ask me if I was up for a walk, she had no idea at the time what a saving grace these walks were for me going through some challenging times at home. So we would walk the lanes with our precious babies strapped to us plotting, planning and dreaming of what the future would hold for them along with generally putting the world to rights. We conceived our local parent and baby group, Little Giraffes, on these walks which opened up yet another exciting new world and community to us.

Despite, and probably because of, the pouring rain this morning it was a beautiful walk, the hedgerows looked lush and resplendent which evoked memories of how Joelle always looked on the bright side, she was an eternal optimist grateful for every day. In addition to bringing joy and fun to the art of nappy changing and child-raising she supported me through some very dark times and I will miss her terribly but I’m forever grateful that she was the one I met at aqua-natal, I’m thankful for the years we spent raising our kids - who have always been best friends. I’m so full of gratitude that I’ve been able to count such a fun, interesting, encouraging, thoughtful, generous, loyal person as my treasured friend.