For the Friend at the Beginning of the End...

Thinking about a good friend of mine recently, who has been having issues with a relationship, has really made me reconfirm several things I know to be true for me.

For me, I will repeat again....FOR ME. I think you get to a point in your life where you learn things about yourself that you accept. One of those things is that I know that the ideals I have in my head may not be right for anyone else, and I don't force those ideals onto anyone else.

So FOR ME, deciding what worth is, and what I am worth as a person, is the first crucial step before anyhting else is decided. Who ever said your value is less than anyone elses?

Secondly, why must we have "someone" else in our lives, the signif other, in order to make us feel worthwhile? This one is tricky. There was a movie years ago with Richard Gere and Susan Sarandon, and they were married. Gere began taking dancing lessons without telling his wife...she thought he was cheating on her, so she had a PI follow him. Sarandon was talking to the PI and he asked essentially, "Why do people marry?"

I love what she said. She said because it is a witness to your life. You are saying your life, all the mundane, little things, will not go unnoticed, because I will be there to witness it.

That is why I find this to be tricky. Some of us need a specific person to fill that void, some of us would be content with just friends to fill that capacity. Perhaps others, don't have a need to have that sort of connection.

Unfortunately, my friend is in a horrible status of limbo, almost to the point of waiting to see what life will bring next, as opposed to reaching out and telling life what it will bring next. No we don't always get to choose what happens, but with everything, you DO have a choice. My life experience has shown me that the other shoe always drops, always. So the choice could be, do you sit around and wait for the other shoe to drop, or do you tear that motherfucker off and throw it back at the door as you walk through it?

Or do you let the show drop but scoot a little to the left so it doesn't hit you smack on the head when it does?

This woman is stronger than she knows, stronger than she lets herself believe. The fire that gets put out in so many of us from life, and marriage, and kids, and work, she still has it. I adore talking to her because while she may call me the "O wise one"...she is the one who really gives me the reconfirmed strength in what it is I believe in. And I am a better person, mother, and friend because of her.

Hugs

~LMS