In August, I will have known them sixteen years. There was Edie, the one who was summoned from the shower by a clueless RA to meet my entire family as she dripped in our freshman dorm room, Tara, the one in the blue dress whom I met while we toured the campus with the Honors nerds (that I somehow thought we were "other than." We were not.), and Amber, the one I interviewed in my first class on the first day about, among other things, having dressed up as the mascot of her high school back in Florida.

I didn’t know when I met them that I’d still know them now, nearly half my life later, having lived in three states since then and now married the better part of a decade to someone different than we’d originally thought. I didn’t know we would slog through marriage, careers, callings and motherhood together, didn’t know I’d still know them when three of us drove minivans and one drove a station wagon. I didn't know we would live scattered in four different states, but would meet up as often as possible, for birthdays and babies and weddings, in Baltimore, Charleston, Richmond, Savannah, Tallahassee, Annapolis and Bloomington. But I did know, after that first year, that those three felt like home. Even then I had a sense that’s grown ever since that this is the kind of thing that only comes around maybe once in a lifetime.  And, I know now, for many people, not at all.

We speculated about why our friendship has lasted when so many fade away. I’ve lost exponentially more friends than I’ve kept, usually to the slow fade, and often due in large part to my inability to keep in touch. To find friends who saw you then, and still see you now, despite the distractions, mistakes, distance and general busyness of life—I know now—is a gift few receive. To wander with these girls this weekend, reminiscing, of course, but also digging in about what life is now, and all the things it’s been in the last sixteen years, was a privilege. Knowing and loving these girls—and being known by them—has and continues to be an honor. What a rare and beautiful thing to continue to be loved by people who have stood with you through so many seasons, so many mistakes, and remain undeterred, unthreatened, and unsurprised as you sit on the cusp of what you were always meant to be.

“What if we take pictures of our homes, just as we find them when we get there?” Tara, nearly seven months pregnant with her third child, had suggested. On Sunday as I traveled home, back through three airports, the pictures and texts started coming in.  They featured clothing and toys strewn about, children sitting on kitchen counters and wandering into the frame; they were scenes captured unretouched. That’s what our friendship is—unretouched. Unedited, unfiltered, messy, raw and brilliant and real. 

Sometimes it feels far away, always there is too much time between visits, but I could not be more grateful for these women who have let me into the messiness of their lives and who don’t balk at mine. They have taught me more about God and grace and love than I could ever list or repay. 


"Bring me to your house, tell me, 'Sorry for the mess,' 
Hey, I don't mind. You're talking in your sleep, all the time.
Well, you still make sense to me, your mess is mine..."
--Vance Joy

Before I became a mother, and before I started getting older, I had never given much thought to the nature of beauty. I knew I could see it in a variety of colors, shapes, sizes and ages. I knew I had seen it in the face of a baby, of my mother, and of my grandmother. Of course I knew it was easier to see and accept in others than in myself, but I had heard it said about me, and sometimes I had even seen it.

When I had my daughters—my second one in particular—I found myself giving more consideration to beauty, what comprises it, and how to talk about it. Now over thirty and the mother of two, my body doesn’t look the way it did before, and mostly I don’t give it more thought than it deserves. As I’ve aged I’ve embraced eating and exercising for health—not appearance or weight—and I am able to focus on that. But my face doesn’t look like it did before either, and that’s been much harder.

After I had Emerie, I developed melasma, hyperpigmentation of the skin often caused by hormonal changes and made worse by the sun. I’ve seen an aesthetician, had facials, and tried countless over-the-counter products and natural concoctions to get it to go away. In many women, it fades when their pregnancy is over or they are finished nursing. But mine is still going stronger than ever 2 ½ years after all that. There are more drastic steps—harsh prescriptions and laser treatments—but they are expensive and I’m not at a point that I’m ready to take them. So now I look for heavy makeup to cover it up. This condition has made me resentful, because it causes me to focus more on my appearance than I have before. Though I’ve always worn makeup, I typically favor a natural look. Now I don’t go anywhere without makeup. The idea of camping or swimming (an activity I love) makes me cringe. These splotches on my face have challenged everything I ever said about beauty and confidence and how they both come from inside.

Except they can’t. Trying to raise two little girls into strong young women is not easy, especially surrounded by messages that tell them their appearance is the most important thing. My children listen to the words I say; I know because they repeat them to unsuspecting strangers all the time. But more than that, I know they watch what I do. Lately I’ve been fielding questions about appearance. We talk about how beauty comes from who we are, not what we look like. When someone we love calls herself fat, we talk about how some people are big and some people are small and all people are valuable and worthy of love. We talk about all the things our bodies do for us and how grateful we are for them, no matter what they look like. When we see someone who looks different than we do, we talk privately about the differences and how we don’t comment on people’s appearances; we just show them kindness and love. We talk about how God made everyone, how He doesn’t make mistakes, and how everyone is beautiful.

All of this makes sense to me, especially when focused on others. But when the focus turns inward, it’s harder and maybe even more important to my children's development. As we prepared to go to the pool one day, I sighed and applied concealer to my forehead, knowing my efforts were futile. Mirabella watched me in the mirror.

“Mommy, when you put that stuff on your face, I can hardly see your spots,” she said, innocently.

I hadn’t even known she had noticed them before. “You know,” I winced, “I didn’t always have these spots. I got them after I had Emerie. Sometimes our bodies change when we have babies or get older.”

“Huh,” Mirabella said, watching every move.

“Do you think I’m still beautiful, even with the spots?” I asked her.

“Of course you are,” she replied quickly, “because you’re my mommy.”

As they often do, my children remind me that I would do well to apply the acceptance, kindness, forgiveness and love I teach to myself.  This modeling might be more instrumental in the way they regard themselves than anything I could ever say.

It's hard to believe it now, but there was a time in my adult life that I said, "I'm not really in the market for new friends."  Granted, I said it to Daniel, probably because I felt annoyed or something-- I can't remember. I'm so far from that sentiment now it makes me laugh.

I think, regardless of where we lived, becoming a stay-at-home mom would have sent me on the hunt for more friends anyway. But friend-searching where we don't know anyone is sometimes daunting.

See, most people I meet are not new around here.  They have family here, or maybe a home church, and lots of friends. Just about everyone I've met has been wonderful.  But their lives are full, so the sense of urgency is just not there-- of course it isn't.  I guess I underestimated the time this would take, and I should have known better.  Making friends was always easy, until I became a mom.  Is it just me, or for some reason, has that seemed to make it harder? Life is busy, we are no longer our biggest priority, and it's hard. I can fill my whole days just with mothering and home management stuff alone.  It can be hard to determine how best to spend time, when days are crowded with so many "good" choices.

I have been so fortunate to meet some incredible women since moving to Tennessee. Seriously-- they are amazing.  Brilliant, lovely, funny, authentic, adventurous, thoughtful women who also happen to be pretty fantastic mothers.  In some ways I wonder if my overall disoriented nature isn't the reason I found them.  Had I been home, I probably wouldn't have joined every Meetup group I could find, might not have sought out MOPS, might not have left our block party breathless only to return with my phone to (probably rather rudely) request a potential girlfriend's number.

I am hopeful I will soon be past the small talk, past saving numbers in my phone with a description of a girl so I will remember which new face she was when she calls, past the itchy awkwardness.  I'm looking forward to cups of coffee at chaotic kitchen tables and nights out without crayons. I'm longing for familiarity-- when I won't have to so carefully measure everything I say (Heaven knows I'm no good at that!) because everything is said to people with no larger context of me. I'm looking forward to having girlfriends that are not long-distance, nap-time calls away, looking forward to having-- and being-- someone to depend on in a bind.

When the awkwardness fades and I'm part of a tribe, I hope I'll remember this.  I hope I'll risk seeming pushy and call, invite, reach out to the girls outside.