She can really annoy me and she can be relentlessly pessimistic but she has been a very positive influence on my life. She is brilliant at listening to my problems, trivial, serious and in between, generally says the right thing. She loves reading - has excellent taste in music, is politically and socially spot on, ahead of time in many ways, has worked in emotionally demanding jobs before retirement and loves me and our family loads. She'll only be away a week and I'm in my late forties ffs. But, at a time when quite a few of her strong female friends have died in the last couple of years, I look forward to chatting again and don't want that to end.