My friend is not doing well. She steps forward, she steps back. New concerns make themselves known, obvious concerns cannot be addressed because she is too weak. For so many people who love her and are very far away from her it is a constant roller coaster of worry. I ricochet between despair and blind hope. And I pray. Desperate, fervent, demanding, pleading 'not yet' prayers.

It is amazing... it comes in minuscule particles and huge lunges --- this understanding of adult perspective. In my reactions, in my feelings, in my thoughts I hear so many things I heard my parents say at such times.

When my parents were both gone, she said "it's too much" and "it's too soon." She is younger than either of them were.... So I pray. And think on all these things.

Her Name Means 'Sister'....

On Wednesday I wrote some friends and said I am calling it early--- 2012 is hereby pronounced the year of the desperate prayer. The rest of the week was hell. The kind of hell you don't even want to talk about. In truth, things happened that I never wish to speak of again. And that was before Friday. Friday morning word came that one of my dearest friends had a horrifying stroke. She lives far away now, and her children called from the airport saying "Pray... it's very bad." So that is what we did. On Saturday, the first snow of the season fell and covered everything except our anxiety. The next bit of news we heard was that she was awake. She was speaking. It was slurred. And she was trying to make jokes. That didn't really surprise us, and although we do not know the extent of the challenge that lies ahead for her, we all sighed something that sounded and felt like relief. A bit later the mailman's shoes left prints in the snow. In the pile of mail, there was an envelope that made my jaw drop. A letter from this friend who calls me sister from far away. A steady , beautiful hand. And the love that came with it... such a gift! I write a lot of letters, and during the week between Christmas and New Year's I wrote everyone who I haven't managed to talk to of late. There were more than two dozen envelopes in a bundle when I was finished. One went to my friend. And one came back. In tomorrow's mail, another will travel to her. It says that I will follow as soon as possible and whenever it will not be too taxing for her. Let it come quickly!

I had a dream...

... last night. In the dream I leaned in to whisper into my husband's ear and I very clearly pronounced "I want ------------." And I woke up. And I remembered it. And it is what I want. And from this moment forward, it will be behind every single thing I do.

Amen.

In 1988, I wrote my friend Jewel a letter filled with poetry --- mostly my own. Twenty years later, she mailed it back to me because I did not have a copy of some of my own writing. When I learned she had died, I remembered that that envelope was in a pile of papers in my living room and dreaded finding it. It found its way to me again today, and I read these words of another in my hand, and could see my friend in them --- coltish, cool and wild at heart.

Home

The day after Christmas, we headed south to the home of a very dear family who are much more than friends to us. It was heartbreaking to leave again.

~

I am so tired of feeling like I am always torn into two.