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My best friend of 50 years knew me better than anyone. But when she died, no one seemed to take my grief seriously

Friends know you differently from family, but where do you sit in the pecking order after they die? Below immediate relatives, ahead of a cousin, behind a workmate?I don’t remember a time in my life when Chrissy wasn’t in it. We were born 11 days apart and were both one when our families moved on to the same street in Geelong, a port city an hour south-west of Melbourne. We had a very Australian childhood; summers spent in our bathers, running through sprinklers; swimming in back yard pools; eating sausages in bread on New Year’s Eve, when we were allowed to stay up late while our parents drank cask riesling with the neighbours, and we’d lie on the cool evening grass listening to crickets.During those blisteringly hot summer days of our childhood, we lived at the beach, where shark alarms were constant and the waves dangerous. Occasionally, Chrissy would paddle out on her inflatable red and blue raft to the big waves out the back where the serious surfers were. Sometimes, I’d panic ...


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