Off Again. Heart-Errands.

It's still dripping this morning and I was thinking how much I like this gray rainy weather. I hear a lot of people say they wish the sun would come out but I don't. Maybe I've been bitten by a vampire of sorts because just thinking about the heat and full-on relentless sun gives me the willies, like I might discorporate into steam if that happened, not unlike the wicked witch of the West when Dorothy threw that pail of water on her.
I almost did, picking blackberries yesterday when the sun WAS out. So give me another gray, possibly rainy day and I'm happy.

I got at least nine hours of sleep last night and that was just a gift. I'm moving slowly this morning but I need to get my ass in gear. Call Ripley's because I'm leaving the property again today to drive down to Sopchoppy with my other Liz. We haven't had a day together in forever and we're overdue.

It's funny how each of our good friends is so different from all the others. When my friend Sue died, I realized that each of our friends knows and loves and cherishes different parts of us and that when one of them dies, that part of us goes unknown and unloved and uncherished. Does that make sense? It does to me.
And that we do the same for our friends. I have two Liz'es and I love such different things about each of them. And they love different things about me. It behooves me greatly to spend time with each of them. We need our friends because when we are with them, we are more fully who we are. Don't you think?

I met this Liz at the Birth Center a million years ago. I was there to "observe" after being hired as a midwife assistant and Liz was the nurse who was on call. She didn't make it to the birth and the birth turned out to be a bit complicated, and next thing I knew, I was gloved and doing what I could to help, no longer just an observer and then Liz got there and she was so cool and she showed me the ropes of the sterilizer and how the Birth Center charted and so forth and she also told me that after her first son had been born at home delivered by a granny midwife, the midwife had thrown her head back and shouted, "Thank-you, Jesus, for another healthy baby," and that she, Liz, did always went into the kitchen after a birth and whispered the same thing. I could tell that she was about as religious as me but that she gave due to whatever powers-that-be and well, I fell in love.

And we've been friends since then.
I could write an entire book about Liz. She's such an amazing woman. The kind of woman who can throw a high English tea and who can scare a bear off in the woods and who loves vintage hats and who can kayak from sunrise to sunset.

But now it's time for me to get to town to pick her up so we can go have a little adventure together. I've missed her. And although it's really hard for me to leave Lloyd again, I need to do this. For my heart, my soul.
I know I like to be by myself too much and I've come to accept that about myself. But I also know that I desperately need to stay in touch with the people I love.

And here I go, to do that.
To share pieces of myself with someone who cherishes them. To listen and to talk and to cherish the pieces of Liz that she shares with me.

A good day. A gray, drizzly day to drive down to Sopchoppy with a good friend.

I wish goodness and friends for you, too.