A Little Thought About Friendship

Friendship is such an important thing for some people. The people you choose to be friends with become part of your life in some of the most intimate ways. You share secrets, experiences, sometimes vacations. You also share grief, sadness, heartache and loss. There are holidays, birthdays, impromptu gatherings, and on occassion just a bottle of wine.

Another part of friendship is disappointment. Unfortunatly, not any relationship is perfect, and not every person understands how important little things in friendship mean to others. Like making plans and looking forward to them, only having them to change unexpectantly, leaving one person disappointed. This happens a lot when one friend has younger children. Don't get me wrong, I love the kids of all my friends, and most of them are younger. My children are teenagers, and I sometimes need more grown up time. This is hard to do when there are toddlers and elementary aged kids around.

Another aspect of friendship that is hard is the difference in faith two friends may or may not have. I feel like I have different relationships with my Christian girlfriends than with my non christian ones. I am not a different person, but I feel like I let my guard down a bit more with the ones who are Christian. They have a better understanding of my trials and triumphs, and the faith it takes to deal with all of those things. I also feel like I am not a great person to be ministering to the non christian ones either, because they can be judgmental at times, knowing my past and mistakes I have made.

When it is all said and done, I guess I am grateful that my best friend is my husband. He is the source for my laughter, happiness and aggravation- what more could a girl want? He also is a very good man, knows all of my secrets- and loves me unconditionally. And he has never broken my confidence, plans with me or brought any extra kids (other than my own).