Thank You for Being a Friend

Picture Above (Jamie, Victor, Michelle, and Paul)

“Thank you for being a friend”. This was our favorite theme song. We used to sing it together at family gatherings in our grandparents’ bedroom at their house in Nutley, NJ when “The Golden Girls” came on TV as our parents socialized downstairs. “Your heart is true, you’re a pal and a confidante.”

Jamie was also my 1st business partner. One morning, after a sleepover at her home in Berwyn, PA, we opened “The Josie Inn”, named after our deceased grandmother, Josephine O’Brien. We crafted a sign and our come-on line was “Come on in to The Josie Inn”! Clever, right?!

We franchised a 2nd location at my Aunt Maureen and Uncle Danny’s country house in Rhinebeck, NY, but unfortunately, it wasn’t quite the success. In fact, we nearly set the entire house on fire by cracking several eggs directly into the toaster. Double-trouble – that we were!

Soon after our grandmother passed away, our grandfather, Andy O’Brien, remarried a woman from Florida, named Mabel Smith. After our grandfather died, Jamie and I took our first flight, sans parental guidance, to Ft. Lauderdale. During this vacation, Jamie and I invented the “Walk-A-Tan”. We figured that if we walked around the pool, over and over and over again, for one whole hour, we would obtain the elusive even-tan! And guess what? It worked! We got a great workout in the process, too. We should have patented this system.

As the years went on, Jamie and I would greet each other with the following ritual: “The Three Amigos: Dun, dun, dun, dun… Hey!” (body language and all). We had the routine down after seeing the film together in the movie theater. We thought this was just hilarious!

Jamie and I shared a kindred spirit, but in our teen years, our relationship grew more complicated likely due to our closeness in age and the comparisons inherent in that. I was in awe of Jamie. After all, as Paul says, “she was the whole package”.

In our 20s, though, Jamie and I began to admit our flaws and weaknesses to one another, and we developed a newfound respect and admiration for each other. In fact, Jamie’s integrity and desire to protect me was so strong that she once told my ex-boyfriend to his face in a bar that he “wasn’t good enough for me”. She was right, by the way.

During this time, I sent Jamie a copy of my favorite poem, “Desiderata”. She took comfort in it, as I did… and still do to this very day.

Jamie was tough, yet vulnerable. Sweet and sassy. Self-aware. Brilliant, gifted-and-talented, yet always feeling she could be better. Jamie was beautiful. She could stop traffic. But she was so down-to-earth, she hardly knew the power of her beauty. Perhaps this is what made her so “intriguing”.

On the morning that Jamie died (unbeknownst to me), I was driving to NYC, scanning radio stations, and suddenly, there it was: a man’s voice reciting “Desiderata”. At the time, I thought it was so strange that this centuries-old poem would be read on FM Radio. Later that day, when I got home from work, I learned that Jamie had passed away that morning, and I realized that she came to me as she was making her way from this world to the next.

I love you Jamie. I will miss you always. Thank you for being a friend. Traveling down the road and back again.

-Michelle May Verno