I am grateful this evening for the friends I have in my life. This afternoon I spent nearly two hours video chatting with my friend Roland. He and I have made a commitment to talk this way once a month on Saturdays. He’s in California and I am here, but we’ve figured out a time and system that works well for us. I am grateful to him not only for keeping in touch regularly but because of the love and support he offered me during the struggle and angst-filled year that was 2011 and through much of 2012. Friends are those who stand by, who circle around you when things get difficult. I have a very small circle who did so during those tough times, and I am so thankful for each of them.
It was nice talking to Roland today in part because we didn’t spend the whole time talking about me; in fact we spent much of the time talking about him and various things that are going on in his life. It felt good to be offering a listening ear and some advice and suggestions rather than being the one asking for the support and advice and looking for assistance. Mind you, there’s nothing wrong with needing help. Indeed it has been a valuable lesson for me and a good experience for my ego to be in a place of asking for assistance when needed. It hasn’t always felt good, but important for me to learn nonetheless.
I am still working to figure out how to begin to forge friendships out here in my new locale. As a somewhat introverted person, meeting and engaging with “strangers” is not easy for me, so I am in thought about how to go about it. My schedule is not particularly conducive to spending a lot of time out and about. During the week between work and my commute home, by the time I get home I am too tired to want to go out, and after full days of meeting and interacting with people all day at work, by the time the weekend rolls around I am reasonably peopled out. Still, I know as I get more settled into my environs and as the days lengthen with the return of spring, I’ll get out and about more often, thus increasing my opportunity for making new friends. In the meantime, I am grateful to live close by to each of my sisters and consider them friends as well as family. I enjoy spending time with them and their families.
So for the time being I am content, grateful for the people in my life whom I am blessed to call friends. May they each be blessed and filled all good things. So be it!
