Childhood and Lifetime Memories and Friendships

Creating a healthy relationship with yourself and others leads to a fulfilling life. These prompts are an invitation to step inside yourself. Take a deep breath. Shuffle the deck. Pull a card. Write your heart out. Rupi Kaur

Relationships have been good over the years. My granddaughter told her mom, “How come you don’t have as many friends as grandma?” I learned in my twenties that I didn’t have to like anyone but I had to love everyone!

How was that possible? Well, it is! And I continue to practice this in my life. My daughter has a few close friends and that is so important. When I attend a grandchild’s basketball game there is one of her friends from thirty years ago.

She is there for birthdays and special events. I am happy for her and her friendships. That is what leads to a fulfilling life and my daughter has that.

Rupi Kaur’s Relationships Writing Prompts — Do your current friendships serve the phase of life you’re in?

Yes. I have my Y sisters who I met in a LiveStrong group. We all have recovery from cancer in common. We have continued to meet over the years. I am closer to a couple of them. We have lost one sister. Others have had reoccurrences. We support each other no matter what is going on.

I have recovery sisters. Some that I have known for 46+ years. I am close to several of them, having had them in my life for so many years. We get together occasionally and talk on the phone several times a year depending on what is going on.

I meet new sisters every year, and those I sponsor are always my favorites at the time.

Water ceremony friendships have been so special to me. I didn’t realize just how close you can get to people who hold the same cause as you until saving the water became dear to my heart.

There are the sisters that I was in a play with in college that I continue to stay in touch with mostly through social media. The play was Rez Sisters and we got close during that play and it has continued to where we mostly stay in touch through Facebook, with an occasional visit.

Then I have friends I worked with that became special when we worked together and even more special after retirement, with one living 10 minutes away, just down the road for 7 months out of the year.

I guess this is a long list and I know I am missing a few. I have begun to have friends who are on the writing sites I am connected to. That is a part of what keeps me writing.

Rupi Kaur’s Relationships Writing Prompts — How important was it for you to please your family? Has this evolved over time?

I am not sure if it was important to please my family. I was the oldest child in an alcoholic family. There is a lot of responsibility there. Not sure it was about pleasing, just an expectation as the oldest. Fitting the role of a super achiever. Family hero some say.

I have been in recovery from the family disease for 46 years and I like to think it is not to please my family, but more to take care of my dis ease.

Rupi Kaur’s Relationships Writing Prompts — Describe your earliest childhood memory in as much detail as possible.

When I was five years old, I remember having had my tonsils out and we were living on the reservation. I had been in kindergarten prior to moving and now there was no kindergarten on the reservation. I remember being in pain and uncomfortable at times from having my tonsils taken out.

My cousins would come over to play games, go sledding, and make ice cream with snow. I had gotten an easy bake oven and made small cakes to go along with the ice cream.

We had just gotten two little puppies. Pixie and Dixie. My youngest brother at the time, would carry them both and he was so short that they would be dragging on the ground. Soon they would run and try to hide from him.

It was overall a good memory despite the tonsils being removed and the discomfort that caused.

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First published by Mercury Press on medium.com