MERRIMENT MOMENTS: Lifelong Friends

I apologize for my brief absence, but I was enjoying a long weekend with my lifelong best friend, Alex. She was so kind to visit me out in LA, all the way from Washington DC. After a weekend filled with great conversation, light-hearted laughter, and some memory-lane strolling, I can't stop thinking about how blessed I am to share life with the handful of women I deem most dear. 

 Alex and I - The Early Years

Alex and I - Trip to LA

Sometimes, I think about how I met two of my best friends in kindergarten, another in 3^rd grade, and my husband in 6^th grade, and I wonder if I possessed some uncanny, childlike sense of discernment that drew me directly to the right ones. During college, I made a couple other lifelong best friends, using the same unsophisticated gut-level impressions, and I was thrilled when they served me so well again. 

I think the truth is that certain people are simply drawn to one another due to some inexplicable combination of commonalities and just the right mixture of differences. We seek to be simultaneously comforted and challenged by those rare individuals who completely accept us yet dare us to become better, just by being themselves. I believe that God places these people in our paths, but we must remain openhearted and honest, like a child, in order to recognize them.

Have a Merry Monday and let your friends know you love them!