Friends

When I was in highschool my best friends name was Stefani. Stef was a year younger than me and actually one of those girls I couldn't stand when I first met her. Perfect hair, perfect clothes, just perfect. We were great friends in highschool. We had all sorts of great adventures together. We went to Mexico in matching shirts we had made - perhaps the only time that I have been called Mrs. Pork and laughed about it. We puffy painted shirts - there were three of us. Lori had cows on hers, Stef had bears and I had pigs. Okay, we were dorks but that's neither here nor there. As we were walking through the market someone was trying to make a deal with us - I'm sure some item we thought we had to have. He called to each of us - come back Mrs. Cow, Mrs. Bear - MRS. PORK! My Senior year we went to San Francisco togther. Our highschool basketball team made state and we convinced our parents to let us go. The best part was we had a place to stay - Stef had an uncle who lived in Oakland and he would let us stay with him. Her Uncle is a priest so we stayed in the rectory. All the other priests must have had plans that weekend because we had the whole house to ourselves. When I went to college Stef drove with me in my little red datsun pick up. We sang Billy Joel and James Taylor at the top of our lungs driving on the freeway. When I got married Stef was my bridesmaid. When she got married, the 2nd time, I was one of her bridesmaids. When she had her first child, a little girl, I was having my 3rd, also a girl. We have always kept in touch. That is until now. I should clarify that I have kept in touch - she is not. I know that she has gotten divorced recently but that is all I know. I had another friend email her and she did write back to him - but still no response to me. We weren't daily friends, we rarely talked on the phone, but we kept in touch. I only have a few friends that I have had forever that I keep in touch with and I figured she would be one that would be there forever. Now I have to figure out why she isn't returning my emails. Do I send an email asking what is going on? Do I just ignore that she doesn't respond and continue sending updated on what's going on with us and asking what's new with her? Do I put the memories in a box with other friends who have come and gone?