Melspeth, The Other Blog

I am sick.  Boo, sick!  Called in sick to work today, sneezed/coughed/sniffled my way through a staff meeting and am now being pampered with homemade onion soup and a fabulous dinner followed by a bubble bath in a huge tub and likely a back-rub, if I ask nicely enough. 

I have been fortunate to have several conversations with friends lately, friends I haven't seen or spoken to much since Jim and I broke up.  I have been alternately pleased and disheartened when the topic turned to my relationship with Rick and the future we are building together. When I tell them about how happy we are and how fantastic and functional we are as a couple, it is almost always met with skepticism.  Too many times now I have heard, "Yeah, he does that/it's great/you're happy  now.  But that could all change/you might change your mind/he might change in a year, in two years, etc, etc, etc."  To that I say Fie!  Fie on you, those who have never experienced this kind of love.  Perhaps that was a tad harsh; let me rephrase...

I am so sorry that you have not been so fortunate to have experienced this kind of amazing, servant-minded love; the kind of love where each partner gives 100%, none of this 50-50 bullshit.  The kind of love that I know down into my bones...that even before I laid eyes on him, I knew that we were right for each other, that in every way that matters, we fit together, that this man was made, molded by God for me - for this.  I am sorry that you are so coloured by my past actions that you cannot see the changes I have undergone.  There are some out there who feel hurt/betrayal/insult on behalf of someone who does not harbour those feelings toward me.  For you, I pray that your hearts will be turned, that you will see the healing that has occurred in the hearts and lives of those directly affected by events of the past.  It is not your hurt to be upset about.  It is not you who was betrayed.  You were simply unaware of what was really going on, that is all.  There are some out there that believe I am fickle, impetuous, shallow  or flighty.  For you, I pray that you will open your eyes and hearts up to see how one brief period of reckless behaviour does not define me in the rest of my life.  So please, take your skewed, coloured, filtered view of me, my life and my current choices and set them aside, for they will only serve to make you miserable and to damage what remains of our friendship.

Let's start fresh.

I would like to start a new feature as it were on my blog.  So many blogs are about the people who write them and I understand that this is the nature of blogs - an online journal, a place to bare our souls, to work out our issues, etc.  But I would like to take that light and shine it on some people in my life for a while.

It may seem strange to start this off featuring someone I am "on the rocks" with.  But I can think of no better person to start with than the person who has been my friend and known me the longest.

Jennifer and I met in Grade 3 at McCammon Elementary.  We were classmates - I was new to the school, she had started there the year before.  We didn't really start hanging out until the day I shared my lunch with her.  Yes, Jennifer, I am going to tell the yogurt story AGAIN...  I didn't feel like I fit in there - I was assigned a "friend" on my first day, Sherry Morris, who did end up becoming a friend, strangely enough.  I felt like an outsider among these kids that all knew each other from God-knows-when and it wasn't until Jennifer befriended me that I began to feel a sense of belonging.  At school, we had to stay in our seats for the first 15 minutes of lunch.  Jennifer had finished hers and was eying my yogurt.  I spooned some onto the lid, passed it the three rows over to her and she licked it clean.  I can't remember how many times we did that, but it is the event that stands out for me that began our friendship.

I got shipped off to another school the following year for the Enrichment program (AP class for those in the US), but Jennifer and I managed to maintain our friendship over the next 7 years until we were in the same school again.  We attended each others' proms and hung out in the summers.  Jennifer was clearly one of the popular people, one of those rare few that could easily migrate from clique to clique, accepted by all of them.  I was a band geek who had spent her elementary years being picked on by her classmates and as a result, had virtually no self-confidence.  Jennifer came to my rescue once again, openly being my friend, thereby giving the band geek some "street cred" for lack of a better term.  High school was a more enjoyable experience for me because of Jennifer's presence in my life.  We had fun together.

After high school, we worked together for a short time at a local nightclub.  I named my first car in her honour.  Peas in a pod and all that.  She always had the ability to draw me out of my shell, make me feel more confident than I really was.  She has a gift for imbuing people with a little bit of her own self-confidence - one that I continue to be thankful for.

Jennifer knew everything about me and liked me anyway.  It was a great feeling, knowing that there was someone on the planet that loved you unconditionally and WASN'T related to you.  She was the maid of honour at my wedding.  I could think of no better person to stand up there with Jim and I.  She looked beautiful.  Even though she had moved to Coquitlam for school, we still tried to stay in touch, though it was not as frequent.  I knew that we would both develop other friendships and that ours might change.  But she was my friend for life.  I met some of her new friends, great people that I have come to know and like in their own right.  Of course they were drawn to Jennifer - how could they not want to be friends with someone so cool?  She is my son's godmother - again, couldn't think of anyone I'd want in that role more than her.

Then I began to hide things from her.  There were difficulties in my marriage and I felt like I was talking about them all the time and she must be getting tired of hearing it.  So I stopped talking about it so much.  Then I started having huge lapses in judgment that were detrimental to my marriage and I didn't feel like I could tell her because then she would disapprove and not want to be my friend.  I was ashamed and hid things from virtually everyone and when asked outright, I lied.  Jennifer defended me to others, not knowing the truth and when it finally came to light, she felt foolish for defending me and not knowing the truth.

I hurt Jennifer irreparably.  I didn't trust her with the things closest to me.  As a result, she did not have the opportunity to give me her advice and counsel.  Even in the face of that, she has shown a willingness to work through it and hopefully move past it.  The ball is once again in her court and I want to publicly state here that after 27 years of friendship, I am willing to work to keep our friendship.

Jennifer has been a better friend to me than I have been to her.  I just hope she can give me a chance to do better.

How are you?  I know that there are some people that still read this and since comments are so sparse (thanks, xxara, for your regular comments), I would like to ask anyone who does read to please reply and tell me how you are, send a link to your own blog, what have you...

Please know that if you are in my circle of friends, I think of you and pray for you daily.  I know I don't say that to most of you and some of you might find that information a little uncomfortable to hear, but there it is.  I worry about you, cheer for you, extol your virtues to others and generally feel blessed to have you in my life.  And I have been doing this without telling anyone and that has to stop.  Each and every one of you needs to know how important you are to me and I will endeavor to tell you on a more regular basis.  Please forgive me for my lack of communication.  I will try to be better.