Released On 21 July 2025

Linda's Blog: I'll Be There For You

The soundtrack to the Friends tv show was the background to my teenage years. It amused me when Friends had a resurgence in popularity a few years ago and a new generation were enjoying it as much as my friends and I had.

Over the decades I have picked up (and lost) friends along the way. I'm lucky that so far, loss does not mean death, but as I near my half century, I'm conscious that this will come and from my parents' experience, may sadly not be too far off.

It was therefore with "carpe diem" echoing in my brain that two of my university friends and I decided to upgrade our annual lunch to a night away. We had vaguely discussed a weekend break for our 50th but agreed that we should not wait and instead, do it this year. We spent 24 hours together and talked non-stop. I remember feeling bewildered as a child on the odd occasion my mum giggled on the phone for hours with a lady she called her "great friend" but who we hadn't met. For me and my sisters, friends were the people we saw and spoke to every day. It was only when we became adults that we too understood how a deep connection can be maintained when life choices and events send our lives in different directions.

Not long after I had my second baby I became friends with a neighbour who'd just had her first. She was a wonderful maternity leave companion, wise counsel and all round brilliant friend. When she moved away, I thought that might be the end of our friendship and I was ok with that. Some friendships only survive through physical proximity and we couldn't maintain weekly walks or drop things off on each other's doorstep. As it turns out, four years later, our friendship continues despite the distance and our mutual failure to manage much more than sporadic WhatsApp messages. When we do speak, the magic still happens, our love for each other reignites and we are both thankful.

There are friends with whom I shared everything like my NCT friends (there's nothing like labour, childbirth and unimaginable exhaustion for quickly forging deep bonds) and those with whom I always hold a part of myself back. One such friendship has endured what may have been the biggest challenge when, much to the shock of her atheist husband and me, she became a born again Christian. We retain enough shared values that we both still enjoy seeing each other, even if our beliefs are a subject that we studiously avoid.

Throughout my career I have had colleagues that have become friends. Some friendships have faded away as we've moved jobs, some remain constant and others hibernate until something wakes them up. This is exactly what happened when I attended a reunion at the law firm where I trained over 20 years ago. The anxiety I felt when I walked into a room of 150 people completely evaporated when I joined a group of my fellow trainees. Despite the fact I only worked with some of them for two years and I've rarely seen them since, the relaxed camaraderie of being back among the class of 2004 felt like being home.

In addition to jobs, sport and my local neighbourhood have given me inter-generational friendships where our shared interests transcend our age. Last week I went for a drink with a friend who is just about old enough to be my mother and is a joy to spend time with. Like my other friends, she is a positive force of nature and is a radiator, not a drain.

To all my friends I say: "I'll be there for you because I know you'll be there for me too."

Linda is a lawyer with two children. She and her husband both work full time and juggle the school run and everything else between them.