As my ship sails on the sea of life, there’s one thing that I claim.

My life’s the richer for knowing you, I hope that you can say the same.

 from ‘For My Australian Friends’ George P. Marchand 1930-2015

 

The first person that I can remember becoming friends with was in 3rd grade when I moved to a new city/school.  We were friends for years.  So many summer memories are of spending days riding our bikes all over town and through the orchards.  She was my best friend.

After high school, we both moved away from our hometown.  She spent time abroad, but we kept in touch through letters (remember those?).  I got married, had babies…she moved back to the States and pursued a career back East.  Eventually snail mail gave way to email and I learned that work would bring her near(ish) to where I was living.  I emailed her to say that I would be happy to drive the 4 1/2 hours to spend a few hours together over dinner.  She responded that she wouldn’t have time, that her work friends would keep her too busy.  About a month later, I received another email from her and what I took away from it, what I ‘heard’, was that I wasn’t interesting enough to be friends with anymore.

I was heartbroken.

I wondered what I had done wrong.

The truth was, I had done nothing wrong…and neither had she.

I mourned the loss of my friend and the friendship for years.  Even though I remembered the fun we had shared, the way it ended was the overriding thought that came to mind whenever I thought of her.  I had had other friendships that had run their course…but this one hurt in a way like none of the others.

Looking back, we were living very, very different lives and I think she thought that I had little to contribute.   But, I have no idea.  At that time, I had not learned how to ask the hard and difficult questions to gain the knowledge that I wanted.  I just assumed that I wasn’t enough.

When I read the poem that the line above is taken from, I began thinking about all that I gained and learned from that friendship.  Some of my first steps in how to be brave were taken during those summertime bike rides.  I learned to appreciate the differences between us as we got older.  I learned how to let go.  And most recently, even though the loss hurt deeply, I have learned that losing her was part of loving her.

So it is with others that pass through and are in my life.  I choose to focus on what I have gained, the richness that was brought to my life.  Sometimes it takes me a long time to see the good in the things that go wrong.  But, it’s like I’ve told my kiddos a million times…if you learned from it, it wasn’t a mistake.

And to my long ago friend…I wish you fair winds and following seas.