What Happened in Nashville

I had been praying for weeks that the time would be both sacred and irreverent.  The Thirtieth Birthday Tour was born in book club over a year ago.  A trip to celebrate the big 3-0.  A trip to celebrate the 12 years of friendship between us.  A trip to make memories for the years ahead. 

In our early dreaming stages it was to be an epic adventure, eight women and an RV from Chicago to Nashville with cowboy boots and coordinating fringe.  In reality it became six women in a rented mini van and two more joining via Southwest Airlines.  Playlists were made and old mix CD’s dug up from the early 2000’s in preparation.  Cowboy boots were packed and the coordinating fringe became a realized dream (thank you Whit).

These eight women were my people in college. Miraculously we have maintained connection throughout the years since we parted ways after graduation.  While some have moved away and some I still see every month at book club, I always look forward to any amount of time with all of them.  These days that only seems to happen when someone gets married.

In Nashville we enjoyed extended quality time together.  We enjoyed staying out late and sleeping in.  We ate weird food at weird times and drank beer out of plastic cups in dive bars.  We hopped in and out of every Honky-Tonk on Broadway, accumulating more stamps on our hands than a twenty one year old on her birthday.  We resurrected our college selves.  Shedding our wife and mother skins, our career and “grown up” coats, we lived, for just a few days, like we were back in the responsibility free days of our youth.

And it felt good to resurrect my college self.  In the eight years since graduation I’ve moved so far from the rhythms and modes of that world.   At its core college was, for me, about my friendships.  I’d forgotten just how much fun it is to have inside jokes created out of the random moments of simply being together.  Or to get ready for a night out in a room full of other girls, sharing jewelry and shoes and curling irons.  Or to poke random guys’ butts in bars and feign ignorance when they look around confused.  (What?!  As a married, thirty-year-old youth pastor and mother of two I certainly would never do that, but I can imagine that it would be a lot of fun.)  It felt good to organize my life around my comrades, even for just a weekend.

These days life contains responsibilities and work schedules.  We’ve married new best friends that don’t want to share clothes with us and wouldn’t look good in them anyway.  Peers are still an incredibly important part of the picture but they’ve shifted away from that center spot they once held during our years dedicated to higher learning.  This is a necessary part of moving on in life but that doesn’t make it any less of a bummer when you realize the adjustment has happened.

By far my favorite, favorite part of the weekend (aside from the 18 year old kid giving me a high five for being hot) was the time we spent on Saturday night celebrating and loving each other with words.  Whit had created a lovely way for us to do this with a writing prompt for each girl.    There were a few simple prompts: five words to describe so and so, when I first met so and so I thought, I’m so proud of so and so because, etc.  We spent six hours on Saturday taking turns sharing these prompts for each person.  For someone like Tommy that is an uncomfortable amount of feelings time, but I loved every minute.  I loved being able to look these women in the eyes and tell them who I’ve seen them become, what they mean to me, and why they make me proud.  I loved hearing what others treasured about each person.  I loved honoring that unique and precious point in time where our paths intersected and we changed each other.

My best-loved prompt was “_________ has taught me so much about…”  It stirred something in me to hear what we’ve all taught each other.  Some lessons were all encompassing, taught by one’s character.  Some stemmed from specific, defining moments in the friendship.  They all reminded me that friends are life’s most important teachers.  This truth is evident in my life.  My people shaped and continue to transform who I am as a person.  I learn from them everyday.  It is what I celebrate most in women.  At our best, in our most vulnerable and profound moments, we are the very best teachers for each other. 

What happened in Nashville was that, for a few days, we lived as though we were eighteen again.  Our independence was high, our responsibility low and our friends were the most important part of our day.  We remembered who we were before we became who we are.  As the eight of us enter into this new decade it felt good to pay a little homage to the twenties.  The twenties are hard and strange and sometimes very awkward.  While I’m excited for my thirties, for the freedom I feel in my own skin, I know I wouldn’t have gotten here without enduring my twenties.  And I know that surviving the past twelve years wouldn’t have been possible without my friends.

coordinating fringe ya'll