Cat Friends

This is not the best picture--- the flash kept bouncing off my cabinet.

These are very special Holiday Cards that I received this year.

A very special group of my friends have made a tradition of sending each other cards at Christmas time.

This group of friends started out as a Message Board Group on the Weight Watchers Over 40 year olds.  JC's Cat Lovers We Were Known

Janet (JC) is our Great and Fearless Leader

When we had all about given up on Weight Watchers she established a new Yahoo Group and we all moved over there.  There are probably 15 of us.  We have been together about 10 years now.  We are spread out all over the United States from  California to Maryland to Texas to Michigan to Utah to New York to Washington to South Dakota.   Very few of us have ever met in person but mostt of us chit chat all day long-- every day.  We have seen each other through everything imaginable.  Difficult marriages, terrible children, losses of parents and family members, financial woes, MENOPAUSE (that is a BIG ONE).  We have laughed together at silly jokes and lit many a candle for our furry companions who have passed away.  We have agonized over decisions about how to best care for our kitties and puppies and supported each other when those decisions were so tough to make.   Janet suffers from many physical issues and she was in a coma 5 years ago-- but she is a tough girl and she made it back.   We are grateful that we are all still here all these years later.   We hope that 2011 will be the year we finally all meet!

So every fall Janet updates our addresses and we hunt far and wide to find the cutest and funniest cards that feature cats.  Sometimes we get creative and send pics of all our furgangs.  Amazingly this year there were no duplicates!  It is one of the best things about Christmas for me.  I am so blessed to have these friends in my life.  Now we have decided to get back on the weight loss road once more and so we are discussing good food choices, exercise dvds and the merits of Weight Watchers once again. 

There is a lot of talk about how the internet and social networking has changed the way we have relationships.  I know that sometimes people can use email and chat and messaging instead of meeting people IRL (In Real Life) and having 'real' relationships.  But it is also so very clear to me that the internet can also draw people together who otherwise would never have become such very good friends.

I love my Cat Lover Friends and all of you who share my life via this blog!