Full Circle

On the 9th May 2011 I told the story of Betty and how Dina had brought her into my life. I lost touch with Dina for too many years to count, but I have looked for her on social networking sites several times. I assumed I could not find her as she had moved to Amsterdam. We became friends after she chose to confide in me a terrible loss. The sad premature death of her brother Simon. We met at work. I was a surveyor and I looked after St Johns Day Centre in Islington, where Dina was the manager. I never did manage to secure funding for that leaking flat roof.

She was a self confessed 'Jewish Princess' with a background so different from mine. But we clicked and we loved cats. She had two black and white moggies named Eric and Mabel. We used to meet up in restaurants in Chingford, take two hours to order and then still be sitting there whilst the tables and chairs were put away around us. She was a 'Fag Hag' and her flamboyant friends would often tell me that my then boyfriend was dying for a bit of c_ck!

I have not looked for her for about 3-4 years, but after talking about her at the weekend, I decided to try again. This time she came up on page one of Google results. Several 2 year old posts telling the story of her cancer and her fund raising efforts to say thank you to UCLH for looking after her, and helping her 'live with cancer'. She was diagnosed too late to cure it. I could find nothing posted since 2011 about her. I feared the worst. I was too late to say sorry and be friends again. I sent three emails. One to the 2 year old charity email address on Just Giving, one to a famous person I knew her brother studied with, and one to a blogger who bought the Ali G Mankini at her charity auction.

I barely did any work because I kept imagining going to the Winter Garden she helped build, to say goodbye and feel sorry for myself that I had lost her. At 3.45pm she replied. This is her story: http://biddingforhope.blogspot.co.uk/p/my-story.html  Dina is one heck of a chick.

And this is mine and Betty's. We are looking forward to meeting the girl who brought us together, again.

Betty's story has come full circle.