One in a million, she wrote

In my mailbox today, a birthday card from a friend I've known since my junior year in high school, a woman who is one of two who have known me for what I refer to as all my life. I don't see her as often as I would like to, or really very often at all. Sadly, it takes weddings and funerals to get us together now. If I had my way, I'd see her every day, just like we used to. You know, in the halls, in the parking lot, making plans for skipping 5th period, or making plans for the weekend, wearing red and white, supporting our school and figuring out whose fake ID would pass at what bar.

Back to the card.

It's not the card itself but it's what she wrote. I read it and I read it again. And then I sat down in the chair and I cried. Not tears of sadness but tears of connection. That she reached out and told me she loved me, it landed. I felt loved.

She wrote: I hope you have a happy birthday. I hear that (nephew) is living with you now. I admire you, your strength, your courage and your will. I'm always rooting for you and will always be there if you need me. Best wishes, my friend! You are one in a million.

It's not the same, typing it out here, but in her familiar handwriting, and in her forethought to get me a card, not to mention to actually put it in the mail, and in her caring about me and loving me, she touched me with that warm light of friendship.

It is some kind of wonderful when someone who has known you so long and so well tells you that you are admirable. Seriously, how great is she? How wonderful a friend to remember my birthday and to write those words?

So many years ago, I must have done a few things right because I managed to get her in my life.