February 18, friendship

Sitting next to me on my desk is a dark grey stone that has written on it in black marker, "beloved beauty grace sb 2008." My friend, Sarah, gave this to me the morning I left for Kentucky. This stone travelled 2,500 miles with me to Wilmore. It was with me in my car accident and miraculously not thrown through a broken window and lost somewhere between the westbound and eastbound sides of I-64.  It sat on my desk with me during my three emotional, difficult, beautiful, and very definitive years in seminary at Asbury (I think I even brought it with me for my three-month internship in Toronto), and then travelled the 2,500 miles back to Portland with me last summer. I cleaned off my desk today and there it was. It made me smile and made me ever so grateful for Sarah's gracious and beautiful friendship with me.  I love my friends.  They have profoundly changed my life.