The Strawberry Blonde

She was a face that i just couldn't place - someone i felt like i knew.  Thoughts going across my mind - i know her  - i am positive but the where, when and the how's just couldn't be linked together.  Our paths would cross here and there from time to time but i never thought anything of it. I figured she just had a friendly face with the kind of smile that makes her seem like you knew her - the kind of smile that wasn't easy to forget.

Life happened ... the huge blow of a loss was dealt. My life in chaos - my being lost in that mess of grief - sadness and struggle.  The loss of my mom and best friend launched me into a darkness of twists and turns.  During perhaps the worse time of my entire life the strawberry blonde walked into my life again - she showed up in the strangest and most random of places...at a mentoring running club for young girls. She didn't do anything special - she didn't know my story...she simply flashed me a smile and had this kindness about her. Fleeting for me is feeling at ease - yet i would feel just that around her, her smile got me to just breathe.  her laugh would spark a smile across my face. Her energy shot light into my darkness. At first I just brushed it all off...but week after week she just offered me more kindness and simple friendship in the most calming of ways. I found myself just grateful for the simplest acts of thoughfulness she provided without a thought to it, she had no clue what meaning those acts carry - and to be honest even now she still doesn't have the slightest hint.  Which tells me fully and completely she's real - she isn't fake.  She is simply just a good down to earth person who is genuine and sincere not just with her words but best of all with her actions.

What a blessing she has been to my life in these last months.  Our friendship has been formed and her friendship is something i find myself utterly grateful to have in my life. She has found it worth her while to befriend me - even thou the me - I am right now isn't the best verison of a person one would want to claim as their friend. But she sees pass the darkness - the brokeness -the uglyiness...she sees pass the trainwrecks filled with endless emotions ...and somehow sees me...and shockingly i allow her to see me and know me in such states, where i have struggled to let so many love ones see and help me during this time. But becasue of her friendship it has helped me allow those who so badly want to be there for me, in. I often think what did i ever do to deserve such people and such friendships into my life.

For 33 years i shared it all with only one person...and having that person taken from my life has left a void and emptiness in me that i know will never be filled...yet i am starting to think that my mom somehow has something to do with this strawberry blonde walking into my life...i believe she sent her...because she knew i needed her...and i think the color of her hair was the sign to let me know she was behind it all. i still don't truly know...and i prolly never will...and thats ok...what matters is i now claim this girl as my friend...my hope is to one day step up and be such a friend to her in return...to better her life in the same way she has enhanced and helped restore parts of mine...she is the friend i truly need that much i know for certain...there's only one true person that knows just what i need...she is the only one that knows what was taken when she left...and though she will never be replaced - she somehow found someone she believes will offer me the friendship - support and strength i have been lacking with her absent from my life.  To this strawberry blonde...you have become a life-line to my being. A light in my darkness. A laugh to my endless tears. Though you aren't here to save me, you show me and remind me that i am capable of saving myself. Thank you for seeing past it all and just seeing me...the me she always saw...i am beyond honored to call you, my friend.