First impressions

Few things bring the simple pleasure of opening a CD for the first time and listening to it beginning to end. Being introduced to each song with no preconceived ideas, no expectations – pure and open to all possibilities. It could be horrible, true. But it could be amazingly wonderful and each song brings with it that little bit of joy and pleasure in meeting something for the first time.

This morning, I’m being introduced to Liz Goodgame’s Fresh Lemonade. Liz is a former colleague from the OUA days at UTMB. She and her husband moved to Delaware several years back. It had been her dream to record an album before her 30th birthday. As I’m listening to each amazing song, I’m at first in awe of her talent and second inspired not just by her music, but her ability to make that dream a reality.

That is my first impression of this album. Like so many things in life, though, the key is keeping that first impression. I wonder, how do we go through each day trying to keep that same awe and joy that comes with that first fabulous impression?

Take the people we know. I love those early days in a new friendship when you’re getting to know each other. Everything is new. Anything is possible. Then, as a true relationship develops, you grow more comfortable and that first impression drifts away into routine. If you’re lucky, it’s a good routine and you have trust and respect and compassion for one another. But, sometimes that routine can grown into something unpleasant. It grows into something too comfortable – where instead of continuing to learn about each other, we end up stuck at one place, with one set of perceptions and one set of expectations. We end up taking each other for granted instead of practicing daily respect and appreciation for one another, instead of remembering the joy of those first impressions and getting to know someone.

I have friends I have known for 20 years. I know I’m not the same person I was 20 years ago. And neither are they. But we grew together. I still remember the good times in the beginning, but the beautiful part is knowing that no matter what, when we are together today, we are still learning about each other, still showing interest in the lives of the others. I used to think it was just this unique set of people in my life. They are good people, but more than that, we’ve all worked hard to maintain our relationships on a current level instead of based on just what we once were.

I have friends I was once close with who I never speak to anymore. We just drifted away. The only difference I can figure between these relationships and the ones that have endured is the amount we were willing to give each other, and the willingness to get to know each other continually as we changed and grew as individuals.

So I wonder…how do we do that? How do we maintain the awe and endless possibilities that are there in the beginning? How do we sustain that throughout the course of our relationships with people? How do we keep the feeling of that fresh lemonade from the beginning of the glass to the end?

Manifesto for a friend

Henry David Thoreau once said “The most I can do for my friend is simply to be his friend.”

I like that. It’s simple. It’s to the point. And on the surface it seems to cover it all – be a friend and that’s all you need to do in life. If only life was as simple as Thoreau imagined. Unfortunately, though, we each tend to have different ideas of what it means “simply to be his friend.” The flaw in Thoreau’s idea lays not with the idea, but with the lack of definition of a key piece of it – friend.

So I’ve been thinking and I’ve been wondering, what does it mean exactly to be someone’s friend these days. In the world of Facebook, being a “friend” simply means to acknowledge someone exists and agree to share information.

A “friend” at the office is often someone you might share a lunch with but rarely if ever see outside the familiar and shared environment of the office.

There are people with whom you can be friendly, but does that make them friends? What really makes someone your friend?

With any relationship, be it business, personal or romantic, it is important to have a clear understanding of the expectations and rules of engagement so to speak. In that spirit, I offer this as my manifesto for a friend.

A Friend Manifesto
I accept my friends for who they are as individuals. I accept their flaws, love them unconditionally and acknowledge that none of us is perfect. No one will ever live up to every expectation we might have.

That being said, I believe that certain fundamental principles must be shared in order to have a healthy, mutual friendship, one in which both people are respected and appreciated. One in which both people contribute.

If I am to allow someone in my life, and give of myself to that person by sharing my time, energy, talents and resources, then I don’t think it much to ask to expect to be treated with the same kindness and respect I extend to people in my life.

• I expect my friends to respect me, first and foremost.

• I expect my friends to accept me as I am, the good, the bad and the downright ugly.

• I expect my friends to demonstrate courtesy and compassion toward me.

• I expect my friends to disagree with me from time to time, but I also expect that in our disagreement, we can still maintain lively conversation and exhibit that mutual respect for each other’s ideas.

• I expect my friends to be there to share in the good and the bad times of my life.

• I expect my friends to be honest. When the trust is gone, the love leaves as well.

• I expect my friends to take an interest in me as I do them.

• I expect my friends to be a friend to me as I have to them.

• A friend is supportive, understanding, patient and kind. I will not tolerate an abuse of the relationship, nor will I tolerate public humiliation for humiliation’s sake.

• A friend might poke fun, but will never intentionally insult me, my home or that which is important to me.

These are 10 simple principles by which a bond is formed and shared. As a friend once said to me, I will fight to the pain for a friend. And I can’t help but agree.

So the most I can do for my friend is simply to be his friend. But in return, I do expect my friend to be a friend to me.

Habitually new

I took the boys for a walk this evening. Their old route, slightly modified to accommodate Barkley’s aging hips and my desire not to walk in the puddles in the alleys. I’d forgotten how much we all enjoy those walks through the neighborhood.

Barkley has been moping the past couple of days. I think he’s missing someone; I know how he feels. When he didn’t greet me at the door tonight like he normally does, I decided he needed an outing. So off we went. The three of us, plus Outside Kitty following behind for her part of the walk.

The past 8 months I’ve been back in the house have been anything but a return to normalcy for me. For the first few weeks, it was the near every day adjustment to the newness of it all. Then, just as I was learning my new house, a friend moved in and it was a good distraction from all that wasn’t the same. But now that I’m back, living alone with the boys (and soon to bring home the cats), I realize, there is no more normal at home. I’m still working at making those new habits, settling into life back in my neighborhood.

As we walked tonight, I realized the neighborhood hasn’t returned to what it was yet either. Freshly planted trees stand in place of the giant oaks whose roots we had to walk over. Houses with dogs we used to know still sit empty. Where one dog died, two new dogs live in his place. Granted the changes aren’t all bad – there are the houses that once stood as trash-ridden slums getting a good cleanup. Alleys are cleaner. Stairs that were hanging by one board have been repaired.

Changes in the neighborhood were evident with each step. A constant reminder that no matter what, something happened, life changed and life goes on. But the one constant is the people. I visited with neighbors tonight who I haven’t yet met, and some I’ve known for years. Once again I am reminded that it is the people who make life, not the stuff that surrounds us.

I’m living solo again. Relearning old routines. Missing what was, but looking forward to each new walk with my boys, each visit with a new friend, and each step in the continual process of rebuilding we experience every single moment of the day.

Friendly musings

So I’ve been thinking lately (yes, I know it’s been a trend, me thinking about things lately), but well I have been. And lately I’ve been thinking about my friends and the relationships I have in my life.

Today I had a nice chat with a friend who until the past year was someone I only spoke with occasionally, for a few weeks at a time over the course of several years. We met nearly 20 years ago, saw each other once or twice a year and then less frequently. Yet once we reconnected, it was like no time had lapsed and despite the many changes in our lives, we have managed to develop a remarkable friendship, one that has meant a lot to me during the past year.

Then there are my Missouri boys I’ve referenced so frequently. This group of men will always be the benchmark for men who enter my life. Individually, they are unique and amazing men, each with his own qualities that make him a good person to know. But together, they are a grounding force in my life. No matter what is going on in my life, or in their lives, I know that a call to one of them is a reminder to me that not everyone in the world is crazy, that not everyone is selfish or demanding, that not everyone wants me to change or be someone other than who I am, and that not every man sucks (although one of them will readily admit that yes, all men do suck he’s sad to say). Every man I encounter must be of Missouri standards, and unfortunately, very few are. My mother even reminded me this weekend that I’d be hard pressed to find friends like them again. Knowing she’s right, I value and appreciate them far more than I’m sure any of them fully understand.

I also have my girlfriends – the gals who always know what to say, are supportive of me, understanding of me and are the ones I turn to when I need to laugh, to cry or just scream. These are the women I’ve met through the years who help remind me of the strength found in the sisterhood of women. Some I see and talk to almost every day. Some I speak to less frequently. Some I don’t get to see nearly as often or as much as I’d like. But still, each is a blessing in my life who, no matter when or how often we see each other or talk, knows that when we’re together, it’s time spent with someone we each cares about and someone with whom each of us can trust.

Then there are those who don’t fit into any specific category – those individuals who, through the years, have been the rollercoasters of my life. The ones I’ve seen great ups and downs with, gone through spells of great closeness and spells of great isolation. But at the end of the day, I’m just as grateful for these people in my life, with all the letdowns, disappointments, sadness and sometimes anger that goes along with knowing them. For it is these people who I appreciate every single minute we have together because I truly do not know if there will be any beyond this current moment. They are the ones who remind me that every day with someone we care about is a blessing, and nothing in life is guaranteed. Enjoy what we have while we have it, and let it go when we do not.

I guess that’s true for anything in life though isn’t it?

Unconditional struggle

Unconditional-- not conditional or limited: absolute, unqualified


Easter. The sermons center around resurrection. Around overcoming death. Around spreading the news of a messiah resurrected. But when I read the Easter stories, I read a story about forgiveness, about unconditional love, about hope.

That’s what I get from it anyway. You have the story of someone who is betrayed by his closest friends. His own father allows the execution. He is left alone to die next to thieves. This would be someone who could easily be justified in a little bitterness and anger and probably some hatred toward those who have wronged him.

But instead of a story of hate and anger, the story of Easter is a story of forgiveness and love beyond all measure and understanding. A story of that unconditional love we strive for but never seem to attain.

According to Christian tradition, Jesus demonstrated an outpouring of love and forgiveness for those who betrayed him. Instead of being spiteful, he showed love, a love so pure that anything, even betrayal and crucifixion can be forgiven. He is supposed to set an example by which we should all live our lives, right? After all, unconditional love and acceptance is the ideal for which we all strive.

It’s even clear right there in the Lord’s Prayer, recited day after day in churches everywhere: Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Think about it – we ask for and offer forgiveness together. We can’t expect forgiveness if we ourselves cannot offer it as well.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu recently wrote:

“Perfect love is not an emotion, it is not how we feel. It is what we do. Perfect love is action that is not wrapped up in self-regard, and it has no concern with deserving. Instead, perfect love is love poured out. It is self-offering made out of the joy of giving. It requires no prompting. It seeks no response and no reward.”

That sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? And some days it seems so easy to love someone unconditionally, accepting that person with his good and wonderful qualities, and the joy that he brings to your life. But other days, it’s a struggle to remember that unconditional means just that, absolute, unqualified. It’s on those days when the cruel words are exchanged, and the tempers flare and the ugly side of people come out that unconditional is the hardest. I think on those days it’s the most important.

I know I try each and every day to live a life of forgiveness, not necessarily out of Christian faith – those who know me well know that has long been left behind. But rather, I do it because it seems right. It feels right to love someone so unconditionally that nothing that person does can shake that love.

Yet while it can feel so right, some days it can be downright painful to maintain that notion of unconditional. It’s on those days that I wonder, at what point does that continual forgiveness and understanding and patience become detrimental? Or if it is real, would that even be a question? And if it’s really unconditional, shouldn’t we still practice an unconditional love even if those around us do not?

I’ve been thinking a lot about that lately, and even more so since reading Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s “Made for Goodness,” the book he wrote with his daughter, Mpho, about living the life of goodness and love that we were intended to live.

In this book is story after story about some of the worst betrayals, some of the most heinous of crimes against fellow humans, and yet in each story is a story of forgiveness. He tells the story about a woman whose daughter was brutally murdered, and how that grieving mother works with her daughter’s murderers to promote the message of peace and love. She works side by side with the men who killed her daughter because each and every day she practices forgiveness and an unconditional love.

How many of us could do that? Most of us find it challenging to forgive the little indiscretions of daily life – the small hurts that pile up on each other into larger hurts. If a mother can work side by side with the man who murdered her daughter, shouldn’t we at least be able to forgive the harsh words said in moments of anger, or the mistakes that make for more work in our lives?

I look at my dogs as the ultimate example of living that life of unconditional love, a life of total forgiveness, a life of complete and pure love. Sure, dogs might not be able to love the way people can, but they offer what they can and they offer it without hesitation and without the expectation of anything in return. They are appreciative of what they receive, but it is never a condition of the love and faithfulness they exhibit.

So during this Easter season, wouldn’t it be a grand thing if we all continued to strive for that unconditional outpouring of love? Love those in our lives without the expectation of anything in return. Forgive the trespasses against us, no matter how often or how many, and love unconditionally.

"..The pain cannot be unmade,
The life cannot be unlived,
The time will not run backward,
You cannot un-choose your choice,
But the pain can be healed,
Your choices can be redeemed,
Your life can be blessed,
And love can bring you home" ~ Archbishop Desmond Tutu

“Just as you are.”

There’s a pivotal line in the film Bridget Jones’s Diary where Mark Darcy says to our fair Bridget “I like you very much. Just as you are.” And women everyone sighed, for it is that simple line that I think we all want to hear at some point in our lives. It’s the single most important aspect of being loved by someone that we hope to achieve. Or at least that’s my opinion on it. I know it’s my number one quality I seek in a man – the man who will like me just as I am.

Girlfriends and I were talking about this the other day, and we all agreed. How challenging is it in this world to find that one person for whom nothing about you needs to be changed, the person who takes you just as you are, flaws and all. It’s the root of the unconditional love so many of us seek.

I look to my dogs as the finest example of unconditional love you can find. No matter what, my boys are there for me each night and are there each morning as I wake. I can scold them for doing something bad the night before and by morning, all is forgiven and they offer affection without the expectation of anything but appreciation in return. Every so often I wonder, why can’t people do the same?

Instead, we look to change people to fit our needs, to fit our wants, to fit this image we’ve conjured in our head. It sounds so easy to let go of all that and just accept who we love as the person we love. I’ve tried doing that, and in some cases, it’s hard. It’s hard to look past those characteristics that make you question why on earth you even care about this person at all. Yet when you stop to think about it, you can find all the reasons you love someone have very little to do with these things about them you’d like to change.

Or so is the case with me I’ve found. Unfortunately, I’ve not yet found that person who can return that love unconditionally, without want of some change in me – be it physical appearance, personality or some other aspect of someone’s daily habit or character, whatever it might be. So as we approach another Valentine’s Day, a holiday dedicated to sharing our love for one another, I ask these questions: Is love ever really unconditional? Can we ever say to someone “I like you very much. Just as you are.”? And shouldn’t we at least try? I'd like to think I do.

To begin anew

“For last year's words belong to last year's language And next year's words await another voice. And to make an end is to make a beginning.”
~T.S. Eliot, Little Gidding


A friend posted that today and I like it. For me, that is what this evening is about. New Year’s Eve – it marks both the end and the beginning, a chance to leave the past behind and welcome a new start.

Most people who know me well know I’m not big on setting goals. (It goes with that whole commitment thing you know) If you don’t set a goal, you can’t be accused of failing to meet it. I prefer to have a general idea of where I might like to end up and then just follow the course that is set in front of me. That’s not how I always looked at things – after all, I knew in third grade exactly what I’d be when I grew up and took every step from that point on to make that a reality. I set that goal and I achieved it. And then I changed.

There were other goals along the way that were not met. Other dreams unfulfilled. And that’s OK. That’s life. Not everything is meant to turn out how we imagine it to be, or how we want it to be, or how we try to force it to be. Sometimes it’s better to just let life be life, whatever that might be.

But without fail, New Year’s Eve comes along and with it the recaps of the previous year, ad nauseam, and the undeniable urge to resolve to make the next year different or better or whatever your resolution might be. I, too, find myself doing that now, just as I do every year around my birthday. These anniversary and milestone dates signal a chance for that fresh start, a chance to do or be something different.

So, for 2010, I resolve to challenge myself to let life be life, to return to living in a sense of reality instead of trying to make reality into the fantasy I might have conjured in my own imagination.

I resolve to keep myself first, as I tried to do last year. Not in a selfish way, but in the way that is good for me. My needs must be my priority. So much depends on it.

I resolve to be honest with myself and stop trying to justify, rationalize or otherwise make excuses for whatever is happening in my world.

And finally, I resolve to let go, to keep my past in my memory, and to leave the words said last year to last year. May really, finally letting go be the ending that brings the new beginning that is so long overdue.