Friendship

In the last week, I made it a special point to do something outstanding (for me at least) in the area of friendship. I took a two hour drive to visit a coworker friend from long ago, who is now a widowed Mom of a 5 year old boy. The boy has some issues too, so he is not an easy child to raise. Her husband passed away, from heart issues, without any warning about two years ago. She is doing everything she can to keep the family business running and raising her precious son. I have been encouraging her from afar for the last couple of years, with many emails, but this time I made a personal visit. I gave her and her son some huge hugs, took them out to lunch, spent some time going around with them in their day to day activities (like swim practice), looked at all their pictures and we laughed so much. Oh it was a delight to laugh with them! I told her how thrilled I was of her work, how glad i was that she is now opening up to dating again and has just recently met a great guy. We shared a lot. Some things were sad and other tings made us smile. As we parted I gave her another big hug and told her she is a great Mom and that I am so proud of her and grateful to have her as a freind in my life.

I did two other "out of the ordinary" acts this last week, with two other friends. It felt exhilirating. These were great experiences, warm memories that we will always have to share. I'm glad that I felt driven to step a little out of my comfort zone and do something special. I feel like my heart has grown larger. I want to keep making some of these good friendship memories.