For Lauren

This is my dear friend Lauren.  If I’m being totally honest I don’t know if I would have predicted, way back in high school, that I’d be toasting her on her 30^th birthday.  But to be fair I think she expected to be rid of me by now too.  It’s not that we weren’t close friends in high school.  We were.  It’s just we found ourselves on opposite ends of the spectrum within our group of girlfriends.  We had this knack for hurting each other’s feelings back when teenage girl feelings are so easily injured.  Then I went and married someone connected to a part of her life with which she hoped to cut ties and, well, it would have seemed that friendship beyond our early twenties was probably doomed.

I’m so, so glad that wasn’t the case.

Because you see my dear friend Lauren has taught me so much about what it means to show up for your friends.  I will never, ever forget the hours she spent with me after we learned about Monster’s diagnosis.  She is a quality time person and she loved me with time.  Time wandering the aisles of Target talking about anything but the awful news I was still digesting.  Time on my couch watching Real Housewives of all the cities, unloading my fears and tears during commercial breaks.  When I think about that period in my life I remember a lot of time with Lauren.  She let me talk about all my worries with regards to Monster’s future and promised me to have a little girl he could take to prom in case no one wanted to go with the kid with hearing aids.  She let me cry and grieve.  But more than that I will remember the ways she just showed up and spent regular, ordinary time with me so that I knew I wasn’t alone.  It was a gift that got me through.  I don’t remember asking for this gift of time.  I don’t think I even knew I needed it.  But there she was. 

And I will be forever grateful.

Lauren is now an amazing mother to Monster’s future prom date.  Her sweet girl was born just 5 and a half weeks after Toots.  Future besties for sure.  She is the friend I go to when I need to know about grown up things like life insurance and feeding eggs to my 9 month old.  This year, a few mere months after giving birth to her first child, she freakin’ started her own business.  A few months after giving birth to my first child I considered showering a huge accomplishment.  I am in awe of her self-confidence.  Lauren has always known exactly who she is.  She is able to speak up for herself in ways that both inspire and terrify me.  When faced with conflict and “people pleasing” dilemmas I find myself asking, what would Lauren do? 

Lauren’s best though comes out in her love.  She is thoughtful and caring, deliberate with her time and attention.  She listens carefully and responds even more carefully.  When Lauren gives advice you listen.  She loves by showing up.  She has been showing up for me for 15 years, surprising me at times with this loyalty and love.  She has been a gift to me, a gift I never feel quite worthy of.

Lauren turns thirty today.  Last Saturday we gathered at a wine bar to celebrate her.  Like a fine wine gets better with age so has she.  The wonderful qualities she had when I met her all those years ago have only gotten stronger.  And the harder edges in her have softened.  She’s worked hard to learn from life’s tough lessons.  She’s pushed herself to grow.  In college Lauren got dealt a pretty crappy life hand.  She had to deal with medical and relational issues that no 20 year old should have to worry about.  For most people that kind of difficult life stuff could have become the defining moment that hardened them for ever.  Instead of letting hard things harden her, Lauren chose to let them soften her.  She responded to those difficulties in a way that still amazes me.  It was more then lemonade out of lemons.  She found her greatest strength and beauty where others would have just focused on the negative of the situation.  I think of how far she’s come in the decade and a half I’ve known her and it makes me so excited to watch the woman she will continue to grow into over the years to come.  I’m so thankful we never managed to drift apart all these years.  And now, well, she won’t be able to shake me.  She’s stuck with me.  Happy birthday dear friend.