Recently, Lori and I were interviewed by Sparkletopia publisher Christine Mason Miller (you can check it out next Wednesday on the Sparkletopia site) and it brought me back to Dually Noted’s beginnings and the spark that launched this blog (as well as a plethora of other ideas we have for Dually Noted). That spark came from my own personal journal entry. When I sat down to write that morning, I had no intention of coming up with a game plan for a collaborative project with my creative girlfriend. I was simply translating my feelings and emotions into words.

Below is that journal entry, unedited and in the raw. I haven’t changed a word of it since it was written. As you read it, remember what Dually Noted is about: two friends documenting their lives and their friendship shaped by a single decision—whether and when to have children.

Tomorrow and Friday, Lori and I will post our first in a serious of observations we’ve made about our friendship since Matteo came into the picture. It should be interesting. In the mean time, I hope you enjoy reading the words that gave birth to Dually Noted.

January 15, 2008
I can see our friendship slowly changing. And I’m okay with that. Or at least I’ve accepted it. Or maybe it hasn’t changed yet and what’s really happening is I’m redefining it in my mind…a pre-emptive strike, if you will. Because it’s inevitable. It’s been set in motion. The laws of nature cannot be toyed with. This is what happens when something like this happens. When childfree friends have friends who start having babies, well, it’s sort of game over. As far as a friendship goes.

Matteo was born when I was vacationing in Kauai. This seems appropriate given that my husband and I were there with my parents and they were there with us because they didn’t want to be there with my brother and his wife and their two kids. Not because they don’t like my brother and his wife and their two kids, but because it was Kauai and my parents had never been there before and they wanted to do everything, which means you can’t have kids with you when you do. Then you’d only be doing kid-friendly things. And that’s not bad. It’s just not everything.

I met my friend Lori through another friend. I call that other friend “The Conduit” because it’s always felt like the world needed Lori and me to be friends, we needed Lori and me to be friends, but we were floating out there, in our own individual little bubbles, and needed someone, something, to bring us together. That was The Conduit. I’m not a fate person. I don’t even feel that way with my husband. But with Lori, our relationship seems subconsciously prehistoric, even though it’s only three years young. Sometimes we don’t remember that we weren’t there for parts of each other’s lives. “Remember?” one of us will say.

“No,” the other will respond. “I didn’t know you then.”

“Huh.”

As far as friends go, she’s a pretty good one to have. It’s hard to explain why. She’s not my traveling friend, the one you plan girls’ getaways with. She’s not my “wing woman,” the one you call up last minute and say, “Meet me for happy hour.” She’s not my crying friend, the one you feel okay to get all emotional in front of. She’s not my friend-since-high school or my friend-by-marriage or my friend-from-work. I can attach names to all of these categories of friends but none of them would I attach Lori’s name to. She is her own thing. And that’s why I like her.

But now she’s her own thing with another thing. Matteo. He’s along for the ride now and I can feel the extra vibe. I can see the shift from one leg to the other. Don’t think it’s jealousy. It’s not about sharing Lori or her attention. We don’t do things 24/7. We don’t need each other to get through the day or the week or the month. She’s got other friends, I’ve got other friends. We do other things with other people. We’ve got husbands. We’ve got ourselves.

And we have each other.

Now, when we are together, there’s this thing between us. Actually, it’s not really between us. It’s more like it’s around her. Or on her. Or of her. Both figuratively and literally. It’s there. And it always will be. From now on.