{Friendship Friday} Tuesday friends

I read a blog post by Emily Freeman today that really spoke to me.

Here you go - have a read - I'll wait.

You see, I've been thinking about that kind of friendship for awhile.

Someone very close to a friend of mine is going through a situation that is quite awful. A close family member was diagnosed with the C-disease.

Amidst all the sadness, this person's friends have really rallied around and "stepped up". When I hear of the rosters to sort out kids and suppers and such, I am in awe of it all.

It's heartwarming to see love in action like that.

And in the same breath, it's a little bit scary.

Okay, a lot.

Because of two things - 1) I know I have far more acquaintance friends than Tuesday friends and 2) I have to ask myself, "am I a Tuesday friend to enough people?"

Acts of service is my primary love language and I am always willing to physically help out BUT I don't do death well.



A mom at the kids' pre-school wrote something on FB about her other child being in hospital so I sent her a message saying shall I fetch the other child and keep her here? It wasn't necessary because of grandparents but she knew I'd step in and bring food/ whatever/ keep the other one/ whatever was needed.

However, if it were a death, I'd be a little more reserved because death scares me and I'm afraid I'll say the wrong thing!

It's also hard knowing what the person needs if they're not a blabbermouth like I tend to be...

So let's talk about it.

Are you a good Tuesday friend?
What tangible acts do you do that we can all learn from?

While we're on the topic of friends, I'm thrilled that I got to meet Pamela when I was in PE nearly a month ago.

We met at the beachfront and had some tea/ coffee while chatting up a storm.

She is just as lovely as she appears online so the time of connection was really lovely!

{Friendship Friday} This could have been so much worse

Last week I received an email from a 3 am friend (Louisa and Funso, she was at my birthday lunch two years ago) telling me she'd been hijacked.

Guess where?

In the TRAFFIC in Sandton.

Not to scare any of you who work there, but it was peak hour and the traffic was gridlocked. A guy knocked on her window with a gun and shouted at her to get out of the car.

She has something wrong with the shoulder closest to the door so swivelled and used her left arm to reach over and open.

Well, this man got more cross and banged with his gun on the window.

Long story short, she exited the car, he and his accomplice got in and drove off.

No-one else even stopped!!!! I mean, just picture it - a totally shocked woman at the side of the road without a phone or anything.

A lady in the car next to hers saw the whole thing, let my friend get into her car and did all the phoning for her. My friend was totally calm (too calm - clearly in shock) and could remember nothing except her home phone number.

This Good Samaritan lady was wonderful. Wonderful! Took her to a shopping centre near her home and waited til my friend's son could collect her.

A few days later at work, she had a little breakdown. She said it was so scary. The person on the other end of the phone was saying simple things (something about a client's investment payout) and she couldn't understand a thing. She was shivering, teeth chattering, and just crying and crying. Poor thing.

She's back at work now and interestingly, she is also "seeing someone", the same lady I saw! How freaky.

So!

The people who are from here will know that this story could have ended up SO much worse. The car's been recovered, by the way... it was an Audi. Yes, they shouted and waved a gun in her face and bit off her wedding rings which all made me cry when she told me, but I'm so glad she's physically okay and on the mend to being emotionally okay too.

I saw the email late in the evening (10 ish) so I waited til the next morning to phone her and talk properly. So glad I did that. She spoke and spoke for about an hour solid.

I'm so grateful that God was with her that afternoon and that she was not physically harmed.

What are you feeling grateful for today?

While the Christmas stuff will stay up til the 6th...

Aimee, do you see your print on the left?

I took the chance last night (my night off, i.e. at home) to start sorting out the messy study. 

• Put all the Christmas cards that were left (about5 or 6) back in the card box 
• Put all the gift labels back Packed the gift wrap that is reusable away 
• Got the two little Christmas crafts (very little - don't get too excited) ready to take some pics in better light this morning 

The other night I tackled all those photo frames on the bed.

First I lay the prints on the frames to see if they look right - sometimes I have to switch pics around to make it balance visually.

So the other night I put the pics in, dusted frames and walls, used up all my Command Hooks and got those things on the walls.

The house is looking fantastic because there are frames everywhere.

Some of them are slightly skew (tell me if you're twitching) but I let go of perfectionism to just get them up. I even put up the beautiful mosaic cross Cat made me.

In other news:

1. Two other kids have joined us in paediatrics - a two-week-old baby girl who's not breathing properly and a two-year-old boy who reminds me so much of Connor, but is slightly naughtier. This little guy didn't settle til 9:30 tonight and I'm wondering if they go through this every night. I would be permanently shattered.
2. I'm turning into the paparazzi. The little boy came running into our section to see what I was taking pics of... :)
3. I now know it's not just K who screams at the mere sight of the doctor. The little boy did the same thing. However, I do very little talking (she's going to scream anyway; why waste my breath? :)) and I see the other mother gets very agitated and tries to talk the boy into being quiet.
4. I have a pimple on my chin from the emotional eating. Yes, I'm eating lots of sweets and crappy food. 
5. It's horrible to say this but today when D told me his mother wouldn't be visiting I went "yay" inside. It's not that I don't want her to see K; it's just exhausting having to make conversation days and days on end. Usually we have 3 - 4 weeks between visits and that's how I like it.
6. K and I had a lovely visit from a 3 am friend on Sat. Our only visit besides MIL. I was so energised after she'd left - it was fantastic.She also brought Happy Feet penguins for the kids which we've since named Penny and Percival :), and some fun food. I need to put up a video of K praying. They both pray for this friend (first person outside family, or sometimes just the first person overall) every night, totally unprompted by us.
7. Speaking of friends, Connor has a thing for Aunty Roz. There was a period of a couple of months where I/we got lots of things from Roz (kids' birthdays, my birthday, cards, letters, flowers for gall bladder op, etc) and now if I say to D, "guess who gave me/ us ____?" Connor says, "AUNTY ROZ!" Too cute!

Do you know the MINUTE I get home I'll be switching on the kettle for a big mug of decent tea?!

So how was your Boxing Day? (this is what we call the day after Christmas although I think it's been renamed Family Day)

PS This picture-heavy post is brought to you by Louisa. I am eternally grateful to her for showing me a nifty feature that's making blogging with pics a breeze. If you want to know exactly what that is, tell me in the comments - I'll write up something.

Of friendship

Since I've spoken a lot on friendship on this blog, I thought I'd share these two links with you.

They are excellent.

I particularly resonate with this one on cultivating deep, intentional friendships.

I know I've been somewhat apologetic about wanting meaningful connections but no more.

This is me and maybe it's my age but that's what I want.

I find myself slightly irritated if I only talk superficially with friends.

There's a time for lightheartedness but there's also a time for deep connection.

I found myself saying to a friend the other day, "we'll chat on Facebook" and I kept thinking about those words over and over.

I don't want to be a FB friend only. I want to engage properly, whether in-person, on the phone or by email, but not in sound bites.

When did we start thinking it's enough to connect by saying, "cute pic" or "have fun" or similar, quick comments on Facebook?

I think we may be losing the power of real connection.

I haven't fully thought this out and there's no solution but it's just the kind of thing I've been thinking of.

My one friend suggested a "date" either with me alone, or with kids and husbands, and I genuinely had things on all the time and dates I had to keep free for work, etc. BUT it made me feel like such a flake, especially because she stepped up and said, "let's get together" and I do want to do it, and yet I couldn't seem to make it happen.

Yesterday I came clean with her and said I really DO want to see you; life is just crazy busy. So at least I don't feel like a flake and she doesn't think I'm disinterested.

Since one of the things on my Mondo list is to have deeper friendships with more people (who may already be in my life but I'm leaving it open anyway), I thought I'd share this link on how to get more friends, just in case there are others like me out there.

I find it much more difficult these days to make friends because I don't want to get hurt but my natural style is to be open and honest and share deeply if I trust the person and if I feel like there's reciprocity.

Are most of your friendships superficial or deeper? Which do you prefer, honestly? Do you find it easy to make genuine, deep friends?

The most unsatisfying social ever

I just had a friend over for coffee (well, actually we had tea) and pancakes (have I told you I make good pancakes?).

It was very unsatisfying and I just figured out why - we spoke about her the entire time.

Oh, except for right at the beginning when I let her in because I told her the kids had just gone to sleep and told her a little bit of the drama.

Okay, I'll tell you too.

D usually arrives at 6 or just thereafter but these days because the babies are so cute, he's been leaving on time and getting home about 5 minutes before 6.

The babies are now used to it and will not sleep til he is home and they have played.

Today he went to get nappies on the way home and didn't get home til 6:30.

I'd just gone back in to quieten them again as they were jumping around like crazy people when we all heard the gate.

K pops up, saying, "Daddy?" and C starts wailing, "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" as if I'm keeping him prisoner.

I hauled him out of his cot (I can't stand the screaming, remember?) and took him to D who was just coming through the door.

Tears streaming down his face, he leapt into D's very full arms.

So they played for another 15 mins with Daddy and then went to sleep.... 45 minutes later than actual bed time.

Anyway, don't you hate that?

I just hate when conversations are one-sided. In fact, it's one of my pet peeves.

I asked D when he got home from gym, "am I really the most boring person ever?" He says no :)

Then, still talking about connecting...

Last week I read The Most Fantastic Blog Post Ever (I won't link because I commented under my whole, full name) about social media.

Julia, I will send it to you though :)

The one thing that stood out to me was this - the reason some of us squander time on Facebook/ Twitter/ blogs (for me, it's blogs) is because something is happening in our real lives .

We may be avoiding something. We may be feeling insecure and need validation from others.

And then, this one was for me...we may be trying to find connection because we're not connecting with others enough during the day.

That bit jumped out at me and bit me on the bum.

That is exactly me - I am not getting all I need in terms of connection (one of my top 5 values is connection) so I try to fill this void through my crazy obsession with blogging, commenting on blogs, etc.

If you don't comment, I suppose you have a deep need to be a voyeur in someone's life :)

Hmmm - does that resonate with anyone?

And about my friend, what would you do?

Just leave it and accept that this is a one-sided conversation, or what? It does happen often.

Thing is, she is good about being there for you if you need something. If I need her, she will be there.

• When the babies were still little, she brought us food one night because we were so tired.
• For my first media thing (magazine story), she was there helping me with hair/ make-up/ clothes, etc.
• She collects mail when we're on holiday.
  

She's just a bit selfish where conversation is concerned :)

Please tell me about some of your friendship issues!

3 am friends

Despite all the journalling on the weekend, my tank is full today.

We had lunch with my "princess" friend who has mellowed a lot due to her very lovely and relaxed husband (I believe we get together with our spouses to complement us). She is as straightforward as ever and we laughed lots, shared about serious things, just spilling our hearts.

There's just something about knowing someone forever (I met her in the Feb of the year I met D - 1992 - so she and I go back about 3 months longer... 18 years!), we spent holidays together, we have seen each other with the morning "look", she stayed at my parents' house, and at our first flats/ apartments.

You just get down to the nitty gritty without needing a lot of icebreaker time. Right?

A very special time and as it turns out, our kids are 2 weeks apart. He is also not walking.

She "confessed" relief when I told her mine are also not walking as she feels such pressure from everyone else.

She wants to leave her son with us so I can train him to go sleep early like my kids because he's up late - joke, because of course I don't need any extra kids to train :)

That was Saturday.

Yesterday, we went over to have lunch with some 3am friends of ours. The food was outstanding (she always cooks my favourite things) and the company even better.

I have a term I call "3 am friends" for people you could phone at 3 am and they'd jump out of bed and come help you if you were in need. We don't have many of these - this is couple 1 of 3 and we love them all dearly.

We don't see each other nearly as much as we'd like to see each other but when we do get together, oh boy, we get talking and yesterday was no exception.

Only the kids prevented us from staying longer... :)

Do you have 3 am friends? Have you ever had to call on them?

My work colleague laughed this morning when I said in response to her "how was the weekend?" question that I had a fantastic time with two sets of friends, one of them 3am friends :)

P.S. I had such a good time I even forgot to take out my camera!