Checks and Balances

My friend Tammy and I walk about 4 evenings each week. She comes by in her red car at 7:00 prompt, I pop in, and we drive over to the track where we walk 3 miles: 13 laps around and around and around. We each keep track of the rounds on our hands, double-checking with each other as "Wait! Was that 4? Or 5?" happens to me...and then Tammy... as we are talking. Nonstop.

Checks and balances. It's a beautiful thing.

Anyway, I'm not sure what we enjoy more: walking because it's good for us or the talking part. I have no idea what we talk about but we are never ... and I do mean never ... at a loss for words. And the funny thing is, we met yesterday for lunch as well. We have our regular little spot where we meet at 12:30 about once every two weeks. Okay...maybe once a week...but seriously. Who's counting?

Before I started working at Hope Chest last spring, our hangout was this cute little pizza place called Brixx that has the best pizza with Greek salad. And then when I started working at Hope Chest our new hangout was Atlanta Bread. And now? Mellow Mushroom. We are kind of boring as we both always order the same thing. Tammy orders first and then I simply say, "I'll have the same thing minus the tomatoes on the salad."

And then we talk and eat our way through the next hour until she leaves in her red car and I walk back to work. She's a fun date.

When we interviewed for this job a little over four years ago, they told us that we had our choice of three houses. I immediately had my eye on the house we currently live in as it's large and on a hill all by itself--a little bit of seclusion on an academy campus. Beautiful. Anyway, as soon as I knew this house was available, I snuck over while Roy was busy checking out the gymnasium and did a quick run-through. Other than the kitchen--which appears to have been an afterthought as it's long and narrow and a poor excuse for a kitchen--I loved this house from the moment I laid eyes on it. No matter that the uneven floors due to the house being moved twice and never leveled once make you feel like you ar walking uphill, and then downhill on the next step, at times; no matter that I can watch the sunset from the cracks in my doors...I knew immediately that it was home. And so, early the next morning I told Roy that he had to come check it out. As we were opening closets and mentally measuring windows, we heard a knock on the front door. Uh-oh. Are we not supposed to be in here?

We hesitantly opened it....and there stood Nancy and Tammy, big grins on their faces: Hi, ya'all!

I knew instantly we were going to be friends.

Tammy is one of those people who never meets a stranger and treats you like you're the only person in the world. She listens to my stories as though they are absolutely fascinating even though they are not. And if I need something, she's there before I say the word. I can count on it.

Every. Single. Time.

When I took Savana to the ER the second time around that Friday night, she randomly texted me. I have no idea why...but I told her that I was hanging out with Savana at the ER for the second night in a row. She said I'll be right there. I said It's almost 11;00! I'm fine!

I'm on my way.

That's Tammy.

And so, when we walk the track, we always end up talking about mundane things and heavy on our heart things and just things in general. And that hour? It flies by.

When it comes to friends, I am blessed. I always find a couple of heart-friends everywhere we live: Rachelle and Kerrie and Jacque and Estee Marie and Dee and Shirley and Raylene...and a host of others that, if I showed up on their doorstep, would welcome me in with open arms. We would sit on the couch and talk as though no time had passed, even if it had been years.

I am rich indeed.

Part of the beauty of being 47 is that, by the time one reaches this point in life, one has a host of experiences and conversations and realizations and relationships (some that last, some that don't) that all culminate into creating the individual that one becomes. And with that realization comes the beauty of being comfortable in one's own skin.

As we were walking around the track yesterday, Tammy said, "I am over doing things I don't want to do. I don't have anything to prove anymore."

I totally get that. There is something to be said for recognizing what we genuinely like or don't like; for giving up on pretending and embracing authenticity. Life is too short to spend it chasing after a rainbow that has someone else's pot of gold at the end.

And sometimes that means embracing the right people. Life is too short to worry about those who reject us or wrongly judge or criticize. That isn't to say we have the right to be rude or cold. I am all for kindness.

But I am also a big believer in filling one's life with good things, with good experiences, with good friends. Friends that stick by you. Friends that get you. Friends that have your back, your family's back. Friends that laugh with you and cry with you...without judgment.

Those kinds of friends? They make the world go 'round. Those kinds of friends are the ones you walk the track with, 13 times around, keeping track on your fingers and talking as though you're the only ones in the world.