Saturday's Word--

Saturday's Word--

Snow is falling softly and quietly.  The deck is covered.  Chairs and a table are clothed in a blanket of white.  I love the lovely way snow falls when the wind is absent.  Straight down to the ground from the heavens.  Snow brings beauty.  The earth is dressed in its finest when it is covered with snow.

Just as snow brings beauty to the earth, so friendships bring beauty to the soul.  Most of the time!:)

Often people gravitate to one another because they share mutual interests.  That might include concerts, shared vacations, camping, exercising, good food.  People also enjoy others who have different interests.  Those people bring new ideas to the table.  They stretch our thinking.  They push our buttons sometimes.  They make us think.  A mixture of the two seems good to me.

Friendships can form quickly or over time.  For some it takes time to trust another person.  To be sure, we do have to practice a bit of caution sometimes.  People are not always as they appear.  However, I think most people are really good inside.  Those that form quickly are fun.  There is no time to think about an agenda.  You simply enjoy being together.

On the other side of that coin are the friendships that take time to develop.  There is a connection.  It is fun to get together. And then one day you realize how much the other person's friendship means to you.    You realize this person is some one you can trust.  There is a calm and peace within this shared relationship.

Women especially need friends.  We find our strength in sharing our lives with another person.  We seek counsel from one another.  We share our challenges.  We want our friends to be honest with us when we pose a question.  We listen.  When we are sick or angry or upset, we call those people who love us no matter what we say.  We feel safe with these people.

I have a friend who read the blog about patience.  Today she told me she was sitting in her car in a parking lot waiting for her husband to complete his shopping.  As she was sitting, she was becoming impatient because I had not written the next word for the week.  Too funny.  What more could I ask than to have a friend who reads my blogs and pushes me to get to the next word?!:)  I hope she reads this one.:)

Sometimes friends come into our lives and then leave.  That used to really bother me.  But, now I realize that life changes.  People change.  Interests change.  Our needs change.  It could be that a person enters our life for a specific purpose.  And then they are gone.  They are like sunshine that appears on a cloudy day.  They brighten our space for awhile, and then they move on.  When we look back, we see the reason they came to visit us.  They leave a sweet fragrance that lingers in our souls long after they are gone.

Friends give a place meaning.  When we moved to this state, I knew no one.  It was very lonely.  I missed the friends I left behind.  I missed having someone to call.  I missed knowing there was someone close by who cared that I was miserable.  Then we met a couple at church, and everything changed.  This new place was bearable beause I had a friend.

My friends are a diverse group of women.  Each is as unique as the snow flakes that are falling.   We share silly things and deep things.  We encourage one another.  We help one another.  We lift one another up when life hurts.  I am so thankful for each one of the women who grace my life with their presense.

Tomorrow is Saturday.  Time to decide on the word for the day.  How about laughter.  Let's see if we can bring more laughter into our lives tomorrow.  Remember how everyone loves the sound of a child's laughter?  Well, let's see if we can bring that kind of laughter into the world tomorrow.

Good night, Friends!