Old friends, and new ones

By MARY JANE HOLT
Contributing Writer

I am so extraordinarily blessed to have good friends. Great friends, in fact. My friends are all different. There is no running theme. I'd be hard put to come up with three things I have "in common" with most of my friends.

I have a number of old friends, folks I have known and loved for more than 30 years. I have friends that fit into the 20 year category and those I have known for less than a decade.

I made a new friend about three weeks ago, a jewel of a person, warm, generous, and real. I like real! On Sunday July 13, I made yet another friend. Now, this one was somebody with whom I had a great deal in common (scary, huh?).

New friends are great too, especially the ones you feel like you have known forever and it's awesome the way they just fit in so smoothly among all the oldies.

Not all friends are bosom buddies. Not all are potential confidantes. Some friends are just fun to be with. You find it's easier to laugh and play with some more than others. You may have the perfect friend with whom to take yoga lessons, go horseback riding, weed the garden, or just share a glorious sunset.

One finds potential friends among immediate and extended family, in the workplace, at church, in clubs and organizations, even while traveling. Granted, you may consider some of these folks to be friends for only a few hours, but you easily know their value!

I have known and loved my friend Cindy since I was fourteen. We were best friends for many years. In our youth, nothing went unsaid or misunderstood. Strangely, our differences far outweighed our similarities and they still do.

So last week, when Cindy and I were talking about dying again (she's in the hospice program in her home town and is slowly losing her 25 year cancer battle) I should not have been so taken aback.

In the course of our conversation, after I had made several references to both being cured and being healed, Cindy asked, "What's the difference?"

Her question should not have surprised me. It should not have caught me so off guard. I should have been prepared to hear her say that. But I wasn't, and it broke my heart.

It's strange how we can go through life and think we know another person so well. Cindy is a biologist. She has taught biology and physics at the high school and college level. She is truly brilliant. She loves animals, all animals. She likes to laugh and play. Today she is still as fun-loving and childlike as when we were kids. Her giggle hasn't changed a bit. It's awesome to be able to hold on to such traits.

Perhaps the way she has stayed alive, through all these years of recurring cancer, is by staying focused on finding a cure; that and just blatantly defying death with that extraordinarily strong, stubborn and fun-loving will of hers.

Yet death comes and if you are lucky, before it comes, either before or after you realize you cannot be cured, you do get healed. But my friend Cindy said she did not know the difference.

For many weeks now we have talked about old hurts deep inside her heart that she still holds on to. The kind that, if you hold them close enough, and wrap yourself up tight enough with them, then they create a shell that folks can't penetrate to hurt you again.

You can't really fault somebody for the defenses they devise. As my heart broke for my sick friend, I thought of my other friend Cindy. I called her. I knew she would pray.

Now that's pretty darn close to the top of the pile. There are no words to describe the friend who can and will pray for you. But it gets better.

You see, as I talked to the second Cindy, I started to cry. I had needed to cry for weeks. The tears exploded. I wondered if they were dripping on her at the other end of the phone line!

I poured out my heart and my tears flowed. Some time, you reach a point where there is nothing left to give except your tears. So I cried for Cindy number one. And once more I recognized the ultimate jewel of a friend that Cindy number two is. When I reached the end of all my words, when there were only tears left, they flowed, Cindy prayed and Heaven opened.