Adventures in Spain

Take a friendship fifty-two years strong,

add in a handful of kids and many visits to and fro,

a year on exchange,

a wedding for one girl,

and now a wedding for the other!

After returning from Spain in January, my mom called to tell me Ines, the daughter of her friend Rosalia (her host sister during a student exchange in the 60’s) was getting married. Ines and I have known each other our whole lives through. Mom wanted to know if I’d be her date to Ines’s March wedding. I was ready to go on the spot.

I hadn’t been to Spain in twenty-six years. Hadn’t seen Ines since my own wedding eighteen years ago.

Mom and I met in Dallas and flew to Bilbao. We took a bus to San Sebastian to see Paula, our exchange student when I was in fourth grade.

Paula joined us in Bilbao one day.

On another we went to the Guggenheim.

These two girls got some time together again.

There was that wedding (Ines and Christopher are both opera singers. Aren’t they especially glam?).

My lovely date.

All the Olabarria kids.

Because of that friendship made so many years ago, three families are now forever intertwined. How lovely is that?