Back Chat: Good Weekend letters to the editor, August 25
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Letters
All letters are edited for reasons of clarity, syntax and space.
Drifting away
Congratulations to Frank Robson for his beautiful and somewhat heartbreaking piece on friendship [August 11]. I am sitting here blubbering like an idiot because I am one of those women in their 30s and 40s with kids, who moved away from the city. Oh, how I miss my childless friends, yet the chasm between us grows with every wine weekend, book club meeting and party I can't go to because I am pregnant, breastfeeding or hosting visiting family. Emma Castle, Camden, NSW
What an intelligent and insightful article. Friendship is what validates us outside our family unit. To have friends you have to be one, yet we still suddenly wake up sometimes and find that one or other party has stopped trying. Friends come in all shapes and dimensions, and longstanding relationships are not necessarily the best, but one's history together should always delight. David Greenwood, Armadale, Vic
Frank Robson's article resonated powerfully for me. My wild, promiscuous, friendship-forming decade was the 1980s, and there are friends from this time who feel like part of my DNA. Literally like family – I could never imagine letting them go out of my life. Yet it is the new friendships I am forging in my 50s that help keep me feeling connected, and connectedness is the key to a good life. Meghan Anders, Mount Macedon, Vic
Thank you, Frank Robson, for helping me recall a heady youth when everyone you met was lovely and invited in, whereas now I am in my 60s suspicion is aroused by those who come my way. But when all is said and done, it's quality not quantity that makes for uplifting chums. And the most constant and enduring now is my eight-year-old Jack Russell. Meg Poskitt, Glen Iris, Vic
What a superb piece of writing. I laughed and cried as I thought of friends past and present. Jennifer Dewar, Double Bay, NSW
Social
T: @MSAUSSIE_G I loved reading this story on friendships ["Drifting Away", August 11]. It does resonate a lot with the life that most of us lead today. It definitely is harder to make friends as we age, but then it takes two or more people wanting to form a friendship and be willing participants in it.
F: NOLA COWLED Loved this article, very funny although poignant, too, and took me back to university days in the '70s. Yes, we were certainly lucky to have been born to live in such fun times. The wonder of it all is that so many of us are still going!
F: GERRI SAVAGE I've abandoned a couple, and been abandoned, but am still making new friendships and treasure the ones that have lasted (50+ years in a few cases).
T: @GRAFLIX1 We begin to realise there are certain people in life that we just don't like and one by one, we free ourselves from these individuals until the day arrives when we realise … that we are all alone.
T: @RASHIDATAYABALI Loved your moving story on rhinos ["The Hunted", August 11]. If only people saw beyond their greed.
F: DORA THEODOROU I'm in awe of Hannah Gadsby's bravery and intelligence ["No Joke", August 11]. She breaks down comedy to a science.
To read more from Good Weekend magazine, visit our page at The Sydney Morning Herald or The Age.