A meeting 50+ years in the making

For almost 60 years, Lila Behrens and Sandra Carawan have shared secrets, stories of their every day happenings and pictures of their children and grandchildren at birthday parties and soccer games. 

For almost 60 years, Behrens and Carawan had never met. That all changed recently in what Behrens calls, “a dream come true.” 

In 1956, Behrens, who now resides in Red Oak, took a shorthand class at Corning High School.  For an assignment, she was given a pen pal at a school in North Carolina and told to write in shorthand. 

While she doesn’t remember being particularly excited about the assignment at the time, Behrens said she never expected her pen pal Sandra to become one of her closest friends. 

Carawan, who still resides in the small town of Fairfield, N.C., agreed. 

“This was just for school and we ended up liking the same things,” Carawan said. “She likes antiques and going to flea markets and so do I. That’s just amazing.”

At first, the two high school students followed their assignment and wrote in shorthand, talking about school and plans after graduation. Eventually though, school ended; the shorthand had fallen by the wayside long ago and the two young women just kept writing. 

Behrens remembers Carawan’s letter about how she eloped with her serviceman boyfriend shortly after graduating high school.  

As the years went by, they each started families. Behrens got married and had three children, and Carawan and her husband had four. 

“I didn’t think it would ever end because  we always just kept writing,” Behrens said. 

Busy with their families and lives 1,400 miles apart, some years they only wrote at Christmas time, but they never lost touch. 

Carawan said she remembers even her children getting excited about Behrens’ letters and hearing about the snow in Iowa, a rarity in their North Carolina home. 

The duo had talked of meeting one another multiple times, but it always fell through. And as they got older, traveling became even more difficult; Behrens’ husband, who passed away last year, was ill for a while. Carawan’s husband is now in poor health as well. 

However, when an opportunity arose in September to visit Tennessee to see Dolly Parton’s house with her daughter, Behrens decided a detour to North Carolina was a must. 

“When I saw her, it was just like I’d known her all my life,” Behrens said. “It’s just like she’s another one of my sisters.”

Carawan, who has never had a sister, said she now knows what it’s like. 

“It was just like she’d been living next door all this time and she just stopped over for a short visit,” Carawan said. “It’s amazing how well we’ve gotten along.” 

During their visit, which lasted three days longer than planned, Behrens met almost the whole Carawan family, visited the ocean for the first time and spent a lot of time catching up with her “sister.”

“I thank the world over for this opportunity, and I hope she can come back and not wait so long this time,” Carawan said.

Both Behrens and Carawan said they’d love to visit each other again but don’t know if it will happen. In the meantime, their old standard of letters and now phone calls will suffice just fine they said.