Raquel

I read with sadness yesterday, that I girl I’ve known since high school has passed away.

We had friends in common, so became friends by default.

She was a larger than life character with a heart of gold; running a very successful local florist shop and doing lots of work for various charities and her church.

Although she was called Rachel, she was dubbed ‘Raquel’ by her favourite teacher (mine too!) at school, Mr Szpak.
In the days before Facebook, she successfully stalked her crush (using the old BT phone book) and was delighted to find his first name was Ben. Many a lunch hour was spent with her planning all the ways she would seduce and marry him; like teenage girls did back then.

My lasting memory of her was in history class one day, with ‘Ben’ at the helm. He told her off for not wearing her blazer. In a huff, that he’d spoken to her in that manner, she angrily yanked her blazer out of her school bag. As she did, a tampon flew gloriously across the room and landed expertly on his desk. She was mortified!! But what a laugh we had about it afterwards.
In dull moments one of us would always say ‘remember when....’ and we’d laugh until we could hardly breathe. It never got old!

So today’s blip is a yellow rose in honour of our teenage friendship (and the fact she was a florist).
Rest in peace Raquel and beware of high flying tampons! :-)

DQ x