My best friend is someone that I didn�t actually ever meet for 17 years, but I carried her in my heart for every one of those years the same way I have for the last several since I have met her in person.� I will never forget how I was a ball of nerves as her plane landed but then within ten minutes of her standing next to me I knew that it was just her, the same her that I had loved and cherished as a friend all along.� It was a gift to have her next to me, it was great to see her mannerisms and connect the dots, but they were not really all that important in the end.� They were interesting and filled my goofy heart with joy, a joy that I cannot ever in a lifetime explain because she was pretty much my only true and real friend for all of those years and all of the years since.�

 

Recently she�s had some rough moments in her life.� Moments that have not gone unnoticed by myself.� When I think of all that she must be going through I suffer.� I suffer silently and like the goofy heart that I am, I try to find the words when I really just want to drive over to her front door with a pot of tea, a couple insanely funny movies and sit and manhate and bitch and laugh and giggle and play like little girls having a sleepover.� When these things happen in her life I hate the nature of our friendship, but I am also far too aware of how precious it is to me to hate anything about it for longer than that pang of a moment when I wish wish wish I could be knocking on her front door bringing some sunshine to her world.�

 

I am that kind of friend and yet..my friends, true friends are rare.� The type of people that I would absolutely bend over backwards for whilst humming Beethoven�s fifth, those are what I call real friends.� The sort that I don�t stop and wonder but just move into action for the sake of my heart remaining true to itself in the act of doing anything, something�meaningful for my friend in need or my friend that just lives in the not all vacant rooms in my soul.

 

I love this friend I speak of.� I love her more than I ever loved my own mother.� I love her more than I ever� knew my own sister.� I love her and I often try to tell her, to explain it�and I know I always always fall short.� There is not a time I get to verbally speak to her that I do not tell her how much she means to me.� I stumble and stagger through my words and feel like the goofball that I surely am to care so much for a person that has weaved through my life for over 20 years now with ease and simplicity and yet without societies norms.� I have fond memories of her and they don�t contain Sunday�s in the park, or movie theaters in the dark.� They contain moments and feelings and emotions and life�s ups and downs and I know her better than I know myself sometimes.

 

Recently in a lame effort to let her know that while I can�t knock on her door I can be a good friend I mailed her a card.� It was probably sappy, it was probably a lot of things prior to my sending it.� But once I sent it I felt somewhat better about my lacking ability to jump a plane and give action to my care for her.

 

About ten days or so later I got this in my email

 

Hey there,

 

I just went to the mailbox and got your card.  Thank you so much.  I really don't like to be talking about my grief all the time, I hate to be that one that everyone dreads to talk to, cuz all I talk about is my problems.   But thank you for your card.  Its good to know that someone out there is thinking about me.

 

:)

 

This made me smile so long that my face actually started to ache.�� I may not have quantity in the friend department.� I may not have a gaggle of girls that will stand next to me at my wedding.� But I do have my soul mate in the friend department and she�s flying in from Toronto and I will never ever thank her enough for it.

 

Recently someone was asking on her blog why we choose to read someone else�s blog.� What draws us in.� I�ve had a few really good friends online that I adore and truly care about.� If I care about someone I tend to treat them the same way I would a person I�ve physically met.� I think I�ve done this easily or perhaps easier than most because of my friendship with my aforementioned friend.

 

Those people know who they are because I will tell you, with much sap and much embarrassment of my dorkiness of heart that I care about you, respect you and plain just like you for you.� I am a doofis like that.

 

And if you are my friend I wish only for you to be happy.� I wish some of you nice hot coffee, I wish other�s less heartache and more happiness, I wish even other�s happy and healthy boys and even more so I wish some of you cheaper by the dozen photographs and your cracks, imperfections, unique qualities�that�s what I see and they are absolutely fine by me, because�.well because if you are my friend trust me when I say that I am trying that much harder to be a true friend in return because I already like you just the way you are.� To C., K., S. you guys inspire me often and you my friends rock and I love ya because you are the who�s that you are.� Know that I would sit down and have dinner with you and your family in a heartbeat, which would make ME happy as all get out!

 

Whatever makes you happy
Is exactly what you will wear
I wouldn't dream of changing you
For a minute or in a year
Whatever makes you happy
Is exactly how you will stay
Whatever makes you happy
Is okay

P. Westerberg