I don’t check my mail very often because I only get a few things a week—mostly spam. Yesterday when I opened my mailbox, a handful of discount sushi flyers came spilling out and hidden in the back was a colorful letter addressed to me. It was a letter from my friend Sara and I was so excited to sit down and read it this morning.
Whenever I have a letter, I always savor it. I want to make a cup of coffee and have an uninterrupted reading experience. I’ve said it a million times but I love getting mail. It’s one of the most thoughtful gestures, in my opinion. To know someone sat down and hand wrote you a letter and took the time to mail it to wherever you are is so special. I’ve been slacking in sending letters to people back home and I need to make some time to do that this week or next. Since moving, I’ve become worse at texting or keeping up with that communication. I feel overwhelmed by the mediums in which people can contact me (WhatsApp, Instagram, iMessage, Facebook, Slack, email, etc.) and I’m always lagging behind.
I’ve been feeling off and I think I wrote about this recently. Not every conversation I have needs to be core shaking but I’ve found that a lot of my socializing has been surface level or revolving around topics that don’t relate to me so much anymore. Reading the letter this morning, it was a breath of fresh air to hear from my good friend about how she’s really feeling. We’re celebrating 10 years of friendship as of this spring and that’s hard for me to believe. I have so many wonderful friendships that date back to different eras of my life and I’m thankful they’ve stood the test of time.
A good friend of mine FaceTimed me the other day to tell me about a dream he had. I was in the dream so that prompted him to call me and tell me all the details of this bizarre dream encounter. It’s always nice to hear from him and one unique quality he has is the ability to make me feel as if no time has passed since our last call. We haven’t seen each other in person in years, we sporadically keep in touch but I know he’s there for me and vice versa. We can jump on the phone without a second thought and resume right where we left off. When we were on the phone I was about to head out to a spin class with two of my other friends. He laughed and called me “a people hoarder” and said I’ve always been this way. That comment or label, rather, got me thinking…
I have so many different friends from various eras of my life. I still keep in contact with people from high school, college, old jobs, internships, etc. I’ve made friends in unlikely ways (i.e. on cruise ships, the internet, dating, proximity, etc.) and they stick. I’ve always made a habit of nurturing my relationships but now as I’m getting older, I’m more selective of the ones I tend to. Not all friendships are worth keeping at full capacity and some are meant to serve a purpose or be present for a phase of life. I’ve come to terms with that more now than I have in the past.
When I was talking to that friend the other night, I thought about my friendship with him and how far back it spans. We met when I had just turned 18 and started working at a restaurant/brewery. He was older than me and a nice person to talk to. We worked together on the slow mid-week night shift and made each other laugh. We’d spend the next few years in and out of each other’s lives, always reconnecting and talking for hours. It’s comforting to know someone for that long, nearly half my life and still have a line of communication with them. He’s seen me through many walks of life. I’ve watched him fall in love with his now wife and become a father to two kids. We’ve come a long way since we were kids ourselves. I can still remember sitting on the floor of my college apartment building furniture together wondering what he was going to do with his life. To see it come full circle into what it is now is something special.
Now I feel more motivated to get more stationary and write some letters. It’s time!
If you want one, let me know ~