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Old friends – 2010

First Saturday of November 2010 – this is the time when we have a reunion meal involving a group of people who originally became friends in the 60/70’s back in the “Broch” ( Fraserburgh in the north east of Scotland ). As the years have past we have all developed our own lives, had families and careers etc. but this reunion event gives us all an opportunity come togather annually and catch up on news and developments of the previous 12 months.

I reflected at the dinner table that we do not seem to be looking any older as a group! In reality we are of course older, but with age comes experience too – so I hope that we are now also much wiser than we were back in the early days. It always engourages me how we are able to refect on so many good times! As a group we have had so many “good times” and it is remarkable to see how our friendship has lasted so many years. This has not been to the exclusion of developing new friendship of course 😉

There are also less happy things to recall of course – this is life ;-( .

Never far from my mind are the members of this group who are not able to present for one reason or another! For those who are otherwise detained I look forward to seeing them next year – for those who have “gone on before” we look forward to a much greater reunion when we all meet our Lord and Saviour!

It seems to me that friends are priceless and we should cherish these relationships and continue to hold on to them as time passes. Life will certainly consist of focus shifts as we move from one context to another but there are certain things which are consistent – I consider this group to be an example of this and I think for that reason we should continue our regular meetings.

Here are couple of photos of the group after the meal this year.



I have also provided an album of additional photos through facebook click the following link to view if you have a facebook account ( you need to be my friend if facebook to have access rights to see this album )

http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?aid=244866&id=627696038

I did write a post about this group when we met back in 2007 – you can read about this here http://ruachonline.blogspot.com/2007/11/reunion-november-2007.html

Reunion – 20+ years on!!!


This was an interesting reunion when Phil met with some who knew him when he was too young to remember her! This lady was the Midwife who helped deliver Philip just over 20 years ago. She remembered the occassion because she was about to go of shift and predicted that the baby would not come until she came back on duty that evening – Philip was delivered about 20 mins later to everyones surprise 😉

Reunion November 2007

Its 3rd November and Mary and I attended, what has now become an annual reunion event. We travelled to the Banff Springs Hotel which is, as you might expect, in Banff on the Moray Firth coast of Aberdeeshire, to have a meal with friends whom we have known for many years. We first became acquainted when we were all teenagers and living in Peterhead/Fraserburgh and the surrounding area. We all went to various churches in the two towns at that time and it was this common interest that first brought us all together. This was about 35 years ago so it is great that we can still get together and enjoy each others company.

Here are some members of the group on arrival at the hotel.

If we are honest there are a few more grey hairs than there were in previous years 😉

Click here to see some more photos taken as we sat around the dinner table enjoying a lovely meal and each others company.

Of course since we first met, there have been some changes, couples were formed, marriages took place and we have had families of our own. Different career paths necessitated that we moved around the country country a bit – but we have still manged to keep in touch with each other.

We were unable to attend last year so it was especially good be back this year again. This year another two of our party were unable to be there, but we look forward to next year when the group might be complete again.

Of course its great to be together and enjoy each others company and to reminisce about the past. But its also important to spare a thought for friends who are no longer with us. I am thinking particularly about our good friend David who sadly passed away over 4 years ago. I did mention him recently in a post about his sons wedding but felt moved to search through my old photos to find a few memories, click here to view what I found.

So roll on the first Saturday in November 2008 when we will do it all again – God willing!