Old Friends

At the request of Stephanie, I am finally updating this thing...I had stuff I wanted to type, just haven't gotten around to it. Anyway...

I've gotten a chance to talk to two special people in my life recently:

First, a few weeks ago, I got a message on Facebook. It was from this girl named Felicia. We did the summer internship up with the St. Paul Urban Ministry during the summer of 2005. It was a really a surprise to be hearing from her, but a few days later, I gave her a call so that we could catch up.
We hadn't talked to or seen each other since March '06, when I was up there with a Spring Break Campaign. What was really crazy was both of us were super-excited to talk to each other. She said her roommates were questioning why she was so excited to talk to me. She basically told them, "He's my homey!" On my end, guys at work asked if this was a chick I had a "thing" for. But I told them we just had this...connection. Wasn't something I could explain.

Getting to talk to Felicia was awesome. I had this huge smile on my face for the whole hour we talked on the phone. Maybe part of it was just the simple fact that someone was excited to talk to me! I mean, I can see how it would be an ego-boost! We caught up and just took the time to laugh. It made my whole week!!! It still makes me smile when I think of it. Here's Felicia's Facebook. How can that face not make you smile! HAHA



The second person I got to talk to was a guy simply known as Ducky (real name: Adam Duckworth). I hadn't talk to Ducky since at least March, if not sometime around the New Year. Ducky and I went to school together at ACU, on the same hallway Freshman Year. But more than that, we became friends, accountability partners, and brothers. He's probably the biggest nerd I know (and I know quite a few), but few people in my life come anywhere close to connecting with me the way Ducky does.
Anyway, I called Ducky Friday night while I was waiting for Kacey to meet me for American Gangster (which was great, but don't take your mom to see it...OR if you ARE Mom, DON'T GO SEE IT). Getting to talk to him was awesome, just to catch up. We didn't get to talk for too long, but just talking was awesome. I was supposed to call him back Saturday night, but my tiredness and Benadryl had an adverse affect on my ability to not pass out all night. (Apparently, there was a loud party in my apartment long into the night, and I didn't hear a thing.) So, I'm still looking forward to continuing my conversation with Adam (aka Ducky).


But both of these conversations got me to thinking. Why was it such a joyous experience to talk to Felicia and Ducky? Why was it better than talking to others? I'm sure time had some to do with it, but it's more than that.

With Felicia, we spent a whole summer together. It started with a retreat with the Urban Ministry, where every one of us told our "Life Path" story. Right from then, I was impressed with Felicia. Her story was/is very powerful, much more than mine has ever been. I knew she would make a difference that summer with the kids in St. Paul. We ended up spending a lot of time together because of circumstance (two of the interns were engaged to each other, and the 5th intern kinda quit), but the connection wasn't a forced one. We knew each others stories, and we were there helping each other do something special.

With Ducky, our connection started pretty quickly after we started being around each other. (He used to hide in his room because he thought our whole hall was crazy...he was probably right, but that's not reason to hide.) We worked at a church together, with me kind of as his #2. But we also started to hang out, get to know each other. And, along with two other guys, we started an accountability group. Adam and I quickly learned that, even though on the surface we were a little different, we had very similar stories, and he quickly became one of my most trusted friends ever. During what my roommate Grant calls "The Dark Year," Adam was the one person who I trusted. Still to this day, though we've talked only 2 or 3 times this year, if I needed to talk to someone I trust, Ducky will be one of my first friends to talk to me.


So, two different friends, two totally different circumstances. But they both made my days just talking on the phone. I love friends. :o)