Banter

Part of my favourite time in the lead up to our annual conferences is the jovial banter amongst consultants that seems to start slowly at first, usually about 8 weeks before the event. It progressively gets more frequent in the weeks leading up and crescendos in the days before we all gather at Conference.

Subjects usually include ribbing about what happened the year before, silly moments that transpire in our conversations during our downtime and mommy brain goofs that make us all laugh. Now, of course, most of these are inside jokes and only funny to those in the vicinity at the time but these are the moments that make the lead up to conference and the craziness that that entails all the more fun.

The banter is now facilitated through Facebook with friendly jabs about booking flights, invitations to annual "events" in a specified hotel room, reminders about missing consonants in words and the fact that "Cheryl knows" are all fair game this year for me both on the giving end and on the receiving end.

These humourous events are a result of a conference that nutures new friendships with extraordinary women from all over the country that I wouldn't have had a chance to meet otherwise. We come from all walks of life each with our own story. We work with a company that brings us together to celebrate our accomplishments, support our trials and empower us to find our own definition of success so we can live life on our own terms and not by punching a clock.

These are lifelong friendships that I have made and I welcome the opportunity to build those friendships stronger as well as make new friendships so that next year I have more people to tease. Bring on the banter....