Here’s to the Friends

This is for the friends who love unconditionally.

For the ones who give thoughtful Christmas gifts, year after year, even when you don’t get them anything in return.  You realize that it is not a small thing to have people like this in your life. It is exceedingly rare, like what happened last year when you walked out your front door and up the road one ordinary January day and saw that a mine shaft had opened up and left a 100 foot hole where the street used to be. Maybe you, dear reader, missed the drama of the sink hole last year? Spoiler: it all worked out fine. The county took care of it. But for awhile there? We didn’t know how it was going to be fixed. https://www.ordinaryholy.com/some-days-the-sky-is-actually-falling-or-at-least-the-vinca-and-blackberries.  Having a friend who faithfully gives Christmas gifts every year and doesn’t mind that she never gets anything in return? That is mine shaft rare.

I’ve had a friend like this since high school. She is one of the most generous people on the planet. Her entire family is this way, her mother and husband and sons. They love wildly and exuberantly. If you need a hug, their home is the place to be. You will be enfolded and held and the love in it sometimes makes you cry. Especially if you are having a hard day.

Every year without fail come Christmas time, this friend gives me the perfect gift. Every year, almost without fail, I get her nothing.  I guess the holiday season is more stressful for me than I let on. It’s not like I plan this. It’s just that I am so safe with her, and so overwhelmed by my holiday “to do” list that it’s easy to procrastinate this one important thing. And I usually procrastinate so long that I end up not finding anything at all.

Somehow, the days before Christmas arrive, even though I am not ready for them. Somehow, they do this every year. How have I not figured this out by now?  When we get together, as friends often do around the holidays, she hands me a carefully wrapped package. This year, it was beautiful earrings that she made herself and that I’ve hardly taken off.  She also gave me a book: A Bigger Table: Building Messy, Authentic, and Hopeful Spiritual Community by John Pavlovitz. It is a wonderful, thought provoking read, and it fills me with hope.  It’s the kind of book that we could read in a book group, you 12 faithful readers of this blog, and me. It’s what we all long for. My friend said that my writing reminded her of Pavlovitz.  What a compliment! I don’t think I deserve that, but it made me happy all the same.

What else can I tell you about this friend? She has the best parties. Last weekend, she hosted a sushi making party. I wish you could have been there. Many friends, old and new, gathered around her big table and learned how to roll seaweed, rice, avocado, salmon, and a host of other delicacies into professional looking sushi. It was a sushi celebration.

I arrived and hadn’t eaten all day, so I made a few but ate more.

That was OK, too.

So this is for all the friends who love. They love you even though you forget to get them gifts. They love you even though you arrive late to their parties and only bring frozen edamame to share. They love you even though sometimes you talk too much about yourself and forget to listen. Honestly, when you think about it, you sometimes marvel at the fact that they love you, and that you’ve been blessed to have them in your life for going on 40 years.  If the loving things your friend has done for you were put on one end of the scale, and all the things you’d done for her were put on the other, you know that you’ve gotten more.

I’m not sure why this friend has put up with me all these years.  But maybe that’s just what love does. I’m so grateful.

And if you’ve made it to the end of this little reflection, I’d love to hear your stories of friends like this. Feel free to share a comment below. All our stories bring light to the darkness.