friendship
now browsing by category
10 octobre 2023
Every time I think I’ve gotten myself caught up I glance at my calendar and realize – with sinking finality – that there is no break in the action coming any time soon.
And in so many ways thats a great thing. I get to see two of my bests this weekend, revisit my high school days and share it with John, I get to see my brother and sister-in-law and then a family Thanksgiving (a little early but when people live on different continents you make adjustments). Then more friend time and game time and then another (different) family holiday, more friends and cooking and football and then all of a sudden it’s December and we have tickets to see John Mulaney and birthday trips and work holiday parties and then … it’s next year. Whew!
Currently, Eli is away at Puppy Sleepaway Camp (aka training) and we are both enjoying sleeping in while simultaneously maniacally stalking the social media pages of his training facility. We miss our Tiny Terrorist.
There are also men putting up a fence around our back yard which will be a nice surprise for TT when he gets home next week. I have a project list an arm’s length and rather than do anything, I’m sitting and trying to type using my left pinkie for the first time in nearly five weeks. I have a doctor’s appt this afternoon and John & I meal-planned for the first time in weeks, so I know what the plan is for tonight (which really takes a lot of pressure off). I’m starting to feel … settled? (Shhh, don’t say it too loudly, it could get jinxed!)
This move has been incredibly character-building (aka hard as f*ck). We are nearly at the end. Rosehilll is sold and we only have four more guests (and four more times cleaning and doing laundry for people I don’t know – what a relief!)
I might be getting on a plane in less than 365 days to go see my fam bam in the UK and that fills my heart with happiness. Eli might come home and not boop me in face which would be a huge win. Hubs is adjusting to his new work role after the big shake-up at the start of the fiscal year. He has a week of hunting planned with his boys visiting and crashing at the house for early rises and daily treks around local, public lands. (The joy he gets from his trail cam is a mystery to me but I love it for him).
I realized that all the things I thought I wanted to do when we lived in Chester County have changed now that we live up here. I’m working on figuring out who I want to be in this era of life (to reference, for no apparent reason, Taylor Swift). I think I’ll be okay.
I didn’t know if I’d ever get here. I’m glad we made it. I don’t know how, but as Robin says (often) in her rides, the only way out is through.
And we’re getting through.
Xox, g
01sept22
It always feels like a relief when September arrives. Even though it’s still blazingly hot and humid. Even though nothing has changed much from August (if you aren’t a parent, which I am not). But it’s the hint of change, the promise of cooler days. The dream.
Yesterday J+I drove up to Mortgage #2 (an affectionate nickname) to receive a refrigerator for the garage. Every part of that sentence is bougie and I know it. I’m pretty bougie (daily yoga at the studio and chai teas and online shopping habits and designer blankets etc etc). But having a second house and now a fourth refrigerator? I’m externally (& internally) rolling my eyes. My biggest frustration today has been trying to scale my photography so this damn blog will upload the files … and yes, I hear myself.
Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about change. Partially because it’s kind of inevitable as the seasons begin to shift. But also because I have been working on this blog and whew – I have changed a lot since I wrote some of my early stuff. I just updated my ‘Curiosity About Me’ page because when I read it, I didn’t even recognize it as myself. Which made my brain begin to whir and spin, contemplating how we all change and evolve (or not!) over time and it isn’t just our hair or our waistline. It’s our values and our day-to-day existence. I changed out the picture of John and I because we look completely different. But I also changed all but one ‘fun fact’ on my list, because I’m not the same person who started this blog in 2011. And I never will be again.
***
Fun fact — all the cells in our body change over every seven years. So every seven years, we are – theoretically but also biologically – completely different people. It’s crazy and wild that we stay in relationships and friendships and jobs and lifestyles for so long – as though longevity and loyalty trump all. Shouldn’t we always be evolving and adjusting our lives to reflect who we are in a given moment? I think so. I mean, I still adore my husband but he’s changed remarkably since we met all those years ago. We’ve just changed and evolved together – as a partnership. We haven’t stayed the same, and neither has our relationship. Which is both the best parts of us and sometimes, some of the worst parts.
I always vow to never become as close-minded or grumpy about new-ness as older generations are and have been toward my generation and the ones that have followed. But perhaps it’s inevitable that there will come a point when I look around and don’t recognize or understand the society ebbing and flowing around me. (Let’s hope not, but I can’t guarantee anything).
About a month ago, one of my closest friends (dare I say best? … I dare) approached me about an idea she’s been working on developing. I’ve shied away from working with her in the past because I don’t want our relationship to become about work and nothing else. I don’t know why but I was skittish that it could irrevocably (& negatively) change our friendship. But then I started thinking about all the people in my life who I love ridiculously and who I met through work. It’s a lot of people. Stretched out over a lot of years. So why wouldn’t I give this fledgling idea a chance – because it’s a really, really good one.
Anyway. That brings me to today – tapping away at this blog and trying to refresh it as best I can in anticipation of what Danielle is cooking up. We’ll see what happens. But I plan on enjoying the ride.
xox, g
23jan22
I went to a talk today about the gut+brain connection. It was hosted by a friend of mine at our mutual yoga studio (where she also teaches a movement class because she’s amazing and is a dance movement therapist and incredibly well-rounded). I am so glad that I went – on a Sunday afternoon, in January.
The talk ended with the idea of community and how a person’s community affects their microbiome and therefore their gut and their brain health. The entire talk was utterly fascinating but as I talked with my friends and made plans for lunch dates and breakfast dates, the importance of community was driven home.
Five years ago my community of people was very different than my community of people today. Some of that is due to circumstance – I stopped working and commuting into the city. Some of it was on purpose – me understanding my own worth and what I should be looking for in friends.
But it is incredibly interesting how my community has so significantly changed my life. In such a positive way.
Anyway. Surround yourself with the energy that makes you light up from the inside. Find the people who re-charge your battery. And then nurture and take care of those friendships. Because they are life.
Xox, g
20jan22
Life is wild.
It snowed this morning. It was beautiful.
I also got the awful news that a friend – a dear, beautiful, powerful, funny, sharp, successful, vivacious friend – has breast cancer.
Juxtapositions.
Surgeries and disease and stress and angst. Broken furnaces and agoraphobia.
But also snow and hitting financial goals. Second homes and new trucks. International flights booked to see family.
Life is wild.
Xox, g
18jan22
Sometimes when I’m beyond tired (more tired than normal MS tired… like, can‘t focus, can’t move, have no motivation tired) I wander down memory lane. This is inevitably aided by the socials, and mostly FB, because that’s where I’m connected to all the people I used to know across my life.
Memory lane can be beautiful and nostalgic but it can also be painful. Today I had two polar opposite experiences. I was reminded of the death of a friend – far too young and now, twenty years ago. I remember when it happened. We’d fallen apart as friends because we were young and I’d moved away halfway through high school and boys and girls – in my experience – aren’t that good at keeping in touch when proximity is no longer a factor. He died in a car accident near State College. It was a gut punch. Surreal. Young people dying always is, but a young person that I knew …. Harder to comprehend. And I had no one to talk about it with because our friendship had been in those golden years of middle school. That time before cell phones and hormones and all the complications that came later. When we just played street hockey and had sleepovers and went sledding when it snowed. He was the first person I told about getting tested for MS. I remember that. Anyway. It was another gut punch moment, seeing the old newspaper article from the Daily Collegian re-posted by a mutual friend. My mind wandered and I was back there for a moment, on Heather Hill, trudging through the woods, playing tag. Standing in rollerblades telling him about my tests. Life is crazy and surreal and here I am, twenty years later, married with two houses and a nice car. And he didn’t have the opportunity to do any of that. How is that fair? How is that decided? It shakes the foundations of humanity.
And then later – a simple ‘like’ by an old college roommate. Someone I haven’t seen or spoken to in over a decade …. Memories of college flooding back, smiling at our shared history and how sharply our lives diverged following Penn State. How we are virtual strangers to each other now, our bond that brief period of time we shared at that formative time in life.
Both men I’m glad I knew back then. Such a strange juxtaposition.
Xox, g
16jan22
There’s snow on the forecast for tonight. We’ve run our errands – and most importantly of all, gotten coffee. And more sparkling water (we realized last night we were down to our last four cans … which for us is danger danger low). So now we’re home, about to take Lucy for a nice long neighborhood walk and get settled in for the snow.
While we were out and about (basically driving around some back roads while we sipped our hot beverages) we got on the subject of Baker. Baker is one of husby’s closest friends and I have known him since almost the beginning of husby and me. Last summer I finally met his wife and she’s amazing. Of course she is, she couldn’t be anything else. I joked for a long time that she didn’t exist because it was over a decade before I met her but she does and she lives up to all the hype. Of course she does. She’s Baker’s other half and he’s just a really great guy.
Anyway. Husby ended up calling and we chatted for a little. Hopefully we will see them soon — the house in Bellefonte is (obviously) much closer to Pittsburgh than Downingtown ever will be and it makes seeing our Pittsburgh friends easier.
It made me think about friendship. Mine, husby’s …. Ours.
I have several amazing female friends but I don’t have many. I used to feel self-conscious about that because shouldn’t I have more? Wasn’t friendship like life — more is clearly better? But the older I get and the more time I notch on my belt in this life, the more I inherently understand that the friendships I have — with my husband first and foremost but also with the women I call sisters — are what make life sweet, worthwhile and full. And I don’t need a million of them, I only need a few really good ones.
Both husband and I are very lucky in our friendships. With our chosen people, the ones we share our time and our thoughts with. They are our family, our people. Our safety net. And we are very lucky.
I’d write more but I have gotten interrupted a million times (Lucy is very persistent) and now I’ve completely lost my train of thought. Ooof.
Xox, g
Day 77
There’s nothing quite like sitting down with a full chai latte and catching up with an old friend. Even if it’s to find out she’s moving away and even if it’s only on the phone instead of in person (this is the current status quo for Covid, anyway).
I’m not always “good” at friendships. I don’t do all the things — the cards and the gifts and calling regularly. But even so, i have incredible female friends and I know it. I am grateful for it. I put in as much effort as I know how to, as comes naturally to me. I love them all indescribably. Deeply and fully. And they accept me for me, which is such a blessing.
Life has gifted me friends along the journey, women (& men) who understand me, who listen to me, who teach me and inspire me. Today’s phone call was a reminder of all the things that happen along the road of life for which I can (& should!) be thankful.
So tonight I’ll research the Hudson Valley and listen to Folklore and look forward to the next time our paths cross. A moment we will inevitably plan and a moment I will relish because this friendship rose out of the ashes of years of hard work and sacrifice. And it is a gift.
Xox, g
D5 Creation