Hi there. How was your Saturday? Ours was pretty good and it started with me A.I.S.-ing 3/5 of my men-folk. Accidentally, as I was under the impression it was a 2 car into town day since I had a job at a friend's house after our 8 o'clock game. So I roll out with the soccer player to get him to warm-ups on time. To be sure my, "We're leaving!" was heard on the way out the door as I pass a child in our attic, I reached for the cell to call my spouse and the phone rings before I can dial. Remember how the phone rings when you're in trouble? Distinctly that ring this morning. That's all I'll say about that.
It was a great morning for soccer, cloudy and cool and warm with friendship. My friend Melissa and I got a laugh as big as Texas when my husband arrived and said, "She AIS'd me!" He's a pretty good sport. Then Melissa and I caught up on very important things like Jim Gaffigan. One of our favs. We love Brian Regan. Old SNL. And Fallon too. Usually, interwoven into our silliness are things about our boys, her students, life after her son's cancer, our husbands, how we should drag our husbands on a double date, movies, friends, and a few global problems we solve on the spot. How about that for a conversation.
Friending is hard. I think it gets harder the older we get. I crave community with worn in friends more than air somedays. So, when it comes I laugh with tears and belly aches and snorts. I bare my soul. I listen and treasure the concerns and jokes. These are earthly treasures.
After soccer, my little re-united 2 car party of 5 crossed the boulevard to have breakfast. We selected seats in the back and happened to be across from a Saturday morning breakfast together party of 4 friends. They caught my eye. I noticed them praying together, they all held hands, then let go with an amen. They had their coffee and oatmeal. It smelled so good I forsook my biscuit and got an oatmeal myself. I felt myself longing for their table in my future. I noticed I was noticed noticing.
Michael asks, "Do you see us coming in here for breakfast together when we're old?"
I say, "Yes. With friends. Just like they are."
We finished and the boys took our trash and as we were leaving one of the ladies said, "I saw you pray with your boys. I can tell you are Christians."
I said, "I saw you pray with your friends. You encouraged us today."
They wished us well in our games, like we do here on college football game-day, and we wished them the same. One gentleman boasts that he converted these, his friends from Michigan, to go for his team. I remark that he must be pretty persuasive. We all laugh and say our good-byes.
I began to wonder who Michael and I will be sitting across from in 20-30 years on our Saturday morning breakfasts together with friends. It burned in my heart to let my friend know then and there that I love her so much that I hope for a few of these Saturday morning breakfasts together with her.
Make new friends,
but keep the old.
One is silver,
the other is gold.
A circle is round,
it has no end.
That's how long,
I will be your friend.
Girl Scout Song Book, 1925
Keep your friend circles open y'all. Melissa, thank you for friending me however many years ago it was.
love,
w
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