Friends

I am so grateful for good friends. I've had some really good friends throughout my life and this past month or two has been a time of constant reflection on the good friends that I've made over the past several years.

Angie and I met some of our very bestest friends six years ago. T&L were moving for graduate school just as we were. Another person who would become a great friend gave me their phone number so we could move out to graduate school together. We rented a truck together and drove out in a two-party caravan. One memorable part of the trip was that a tire needed to be replaced on the moving trailer at the truck rental store, even before we pulled off the lot. The other three tires on that thing were replaced in Wyoming (in the middle of nowhere, let me tell you), I think in Nebraska, and the last one in Indiana. Anyway, T&L are our very best friends. It's hard to imagine life without them right now. We have been through the last several years of life together and shared many happy moments with them. If you know them you'll know exactly what I'm talking about when I say they are amazing in every way. If you don't know them, it would take a dissertation (besides the one I'm writing) to explain it all to you. I wish you could know them.

Anyway, we got to our destination safely and were very happy and grateful to arrive. T&L were the first to unload their stuff from the truck. We hadn't closed on our home yet and our stuff was loaded in the truck first. When we got here, there were tons of branch members literally waiting around for us to pull up so they could greet us and help unload. I'd been calling ahead to give our ETA. The last tire repair was so delayed that, from what I remember, our 7pm estimate turned into 10pm or so. And you wouldn't believe me if I told you how many people were there waiting for us. It was awesome.

Well, that was on a Saturday night. We went to church the next day and we were all invited over to a family's home for lunch. They knew we weren't prepared to fix a meal for ourselves. It was the biggest spaghetti meal I can ever remember. It was so nice of them.

The next day we closed on our house and I, somehow, maneuvered the monstrous truck (the wrong way, oops!) up our winding, narrow road and positioned it to be unloaded right at our porch. So many people showed up to help us move. It was awesome.

And then we began our adventure here with a 22-month old and a 3-month old (who was on oxygen at the time). The first week went by in a quick blur with all the orientation meetings I had at school and in my department.

Then, on the next Saturday, we went to help a new family unload their pod. All the same people, it seems, showed up to yet another move. All to help a family they'd never met. And it didn't matter. This was the gospel in action.

Little did I know that the man who stood before me would become my best friend who I'd nickname JP a few years later. We hefted their things up two flights of stairs for a while under that hot sun. I remember the pizza toward the end of the move with a watering mouth. Yum.

If you've been keeping a running total of how many best friends there are in this story, you may be asking, "How can someone have more than one best friend?" When I was a kid, I thought you could only have one best friend. I used to keep track of who that person was. It changed often in my early years. I also kept track of my favorite song, car, color, sword, karate style, scripture, sport, sibling, etc.

I came to realize for myself that my "best" whatever was really a class, a level. It was not a pedestal with just enough space for one person, idea or sound. I have many favorite things now and the list keeps growing with time. Just for music (and you can ask my wife to verify this), I have said, "This is my favorite song" so many times that I now have to say, "It's in my top 100."

I'm just saying there's room in my heart for more than one best friend.

A year went by and then another. We helped people move in and move out. A new family moved in at that point that we became pretty good friends with too. Even though this guy was the newcomer, we became friends over time for lots of different reasons. We talked about all sorts of different stuff from football and business to "alogarithms."

"What?"

"You know, patterns for doing things."

"You mean, 'algorithms'."

"That's what I said."

"No. You said a mix of 'algorithm' and 'logarithm'. They're not the same thing. Please, never say that word again."

We also talked about astronomy and other cool things. I got to know him over four years and am really, really glad I did. He's great. But this reminds me, he never told me about Big Foot. I only heard reference of it from other people. Please, tell me!

Our family has just watched JP and his family move about as far away as one can move and still live in the United States, Mr BF Alogarithm has gone (but not too far) and this week we just said goodbye to T&L. And this is where the tears start to flow.

Goodbye, my friends. Better yet, "See you later."

I love you. We love you.