A few weeks ago now, our dear friends Aaron and Nicole spent their vacation time to drive half-way across the country to visit us. Josh and Aaron were roommates for a year in college. Nicole and I knew each other throughout college, but not very well. The summer after she and I graduated, I subletted a room in her apartment. That summer, Josh proposed. I think it was the very next day that Nicole and Aaron got engaged. The next Spring, in May, Josh and I got married. A month later, Nicole and Aaron got married. Josh and I moved to a little town south of Charlottesville where we rented our first home together–a cute little cottage with a wood stove and nice wooden deck out back. Aaron and Nicole rented a small house on a cow farm less than ten minutes away.
So, through some of the most significant events in our lives thus far (the whole dating, engagement, marriage thing) we had these friends walking close beside us, trying, as we were, to figure it all out. And, during that first year of our marriage, these dear friends were our community. We would spend at least a couple nights a week together, sharing dinner or playing Bridge. Our marriages were brand new. (They are still brand new, really. But then they were months, not years, old). Alongside each other, we were learning to be wives and husbands. And we became dear friends. At some point, we stopped pretending in front of each other. They saw us as we were. And they were ok with how we were. It was beautiful, really.
These dear friends are family to us. We have seen each other only a few times in the two years since we moved away. But, each time it is as if no time at all has passed, despite the fact that we now have an almost-one-year-old. They love our little boy and, while he changes the dynamics a bit, we still fill his naptimes with as many hands of Bridge as we can squeeze in.
So, it has happened slowly and not really very intentionally that Nicole and I have grown to know and love each other. We have just shared real life together and have become dear friends in the midst of it. We have low expectations for each other. We don’t call or email regularly. We don’t feel pressured to send Birthday cards. But, we have confidence in our friendship. When we spend time together I am uncharacteristically quick to let down my guard because, I think, I feel that I am known and loved. So, when we the four of us see each other in another six months or so, I have no doubt that we will pick up where we have left off. We will catch up on each other’s lives, relax in each other’s company, and play some Bridge.
