Missin' Philsgirl

I miss Philsgirl. She is the only reason I survived the last 2 years I lived in the Wild West and since I've been back I've really missed her. I have a good time hanging out with Hecate, Daddy-O and my family, and I adore spending time with Curley but I really miss Philsgirl.

Philsgirl is my polar opposite and some might argue that the only reason we became friends is because we were both transplants into the Wild West and hated living there. Well, maybe that was the case in the beginning; however, that small reason quickly dissipated after a few conversations when we learned we were both sarcastic, quick witted, a bit lazy, complete procrastinators, and lovers of cheese. Okay, the last bit is true and a bit weird, but important because we ate lots of nachos without compunction or TUMS.

Philsgirl and I are also different as night day and one might wonder how in the hell we became friends. She loves to camp and being dirty, touching bugs and other nasty creepy crawly creatures, is fearless, enjoys hunting and fishing, thinks peeing outside is vital to ones health, and could go for a week without a shower and not worry about it, especially if she's out in the woods or up in the mountains. She gets excited about seeing a bear in her backyard while I'm worried that the bear think of her as dinner. While she's miss nature girl, she's not a butchy tom boy- she's a cute, slim, short blond with bright green eyes. While I have zero interest in all those things she loves, she doesn't really think it's necessary to own 100+ pair of shoes, isn't really fond of make up, she owns 1 skirt (made of denim), a mall is not considered a jungle, and she doesn't like coffee.

She would make fun of me when she opened my freezer to find 4 kinds of ice cream, about 9 frozen pizzas, several bags of coffee beans, and a variety of toaster strudel pastries. I would make fun of her freezer when she could identify bags of scat to their animal excreters. She would harass me over the fact that I would color code my clothes hanging in my closet. I would harass her about her collection of animal skulls arrange in a curio cabinet according to size.

But we bonded over shared shifts at the cafe and then together as teachers at the high school in Wild West. We shared the same prep period and would bemoan the stupid students, their stupider parents, and our nasty fellow faculty members.

While we are different as night and day, we also found we loved to listen to each other and tease. We would make fun of each other's idiosyncrasies with chuckles in our voices and twinkles in our eyes or out right belly laughs. Our idiosyncrasies, while different, actually brought us together. We both hate the Wild West and most of the people there. We both loves to eat and celebrated Fat Girl Fridays. We loved to watch Sex and the City and drink margaritas. We both love to laugh and consider sarcasm as necessary as water.

Some of my best times in the Wild West can be attributed to time spend with Philsgirl. Road trips to Billings, Miles City and Ingomar, MT all came with huge laughs. She was there the first and only time I've EVER peed in an outhouse. We had Thanksgiving and birthdays together. We graded papers together, took walks, and hung out at each other's homes. We went to church dinners together. The first time I ever saw an owl was because of Philsgirl who is an owl lover- and it was like magic. We just sat in the car watching it watch us and listening to it hoot. We had drinking nights with her hubby and another teacher from school- the 4 of us would sit around and drink pomegranate martinis and eat until we were sick with laughter as well as the food and drink. Most of the time we spent together involved so much laughing that we about peed ourselves and would gasp for air.

I'm so happy to be away from the WIld West and I'm super duper excited that Philsgirl and her hubby finally got transferred out of there and into her beloved mountains on the other side of the Wild West state.

I miss her bunches! We still email and call but that's not the same. So something good did come out of living in the Wild West.

Sometimes you need a girlfriend,
Maggie