Skip to main content

Real Friends Wear Maroon


I have some great friends.  I really do.  These past few years have been filled with more tears and more pain than I knew possible, but my friends have come out of the woodworks to surround me and care for me and that has been indescribable.  There are about twelve girlfriends who have been my rocks and I can't even imagine doing the good, the bad or the ugly without them.

This past weekend, three of those friends did it again!  Last Spring we planned a trip to A&M with our boys and we've been looking forward to it for about six months.  The weekend was fun and time with our kids was great.  I loved them getting to spend some time with all of my kids and I loved that they got to hang out with my big kids.  We went to Midnight Yell and Step Off and the football game and we went bowling (16 of us) and played arcade games.  We stayed up talking past midnight and it was dreamy.  Overall, it was a fantastic weekend.

But what stuck out to me the most is that real friends wear maroon.  I'm not making some "Texas A&M is the best" statement here.  This weekend and all of the maroon was the most beautiful word picture of friendship for me.  These girls have families of their own and they gave up a weekend with them to spend the weekend with me.  They really came strictly to care for me.  On top of that, two bleed green and gold ONLY (Sic 'em Bears) and one is a purple wearing Horn Frog for life.  They didn't just come to see me, they came to fully support me even to the point of buying maroon and wearing it.  (Folks, their boys all had on Texas A&M shirts and hats--it wasn't just moms in maroon.). My friends came to fully be with me for the weekend and I am so humbled and grateful that I have friends who are full-in on being friends.

Real friends wear maroon (figuratively).  Real friends are all in and all there selflessly.  In this season, I am the one they are wearing maroon for.  In another season, we will wear another color for another friend.  I am so grateful for the time and effort and financial sacrifice they made for me this weekend. The talking and laughing past midnight each night was good for my soul.  And the maroon. . . . the maroon was the icing and the cherry on top!  It is so good to know that I have a support system of women who have been praying for me for several years and who have been sticking by my side.  They laugh with me, they cry with me, they push me to be better when I am lacking and then hold me up when I cannot stand on my own.  They are all over the world:  England, Saudi Arabia, Germany, Ohio, Missouri, Texas, Colorado, Virginia, California, Arizona and Illinois and every last one of them has been figuratively wearing maroon for me like these three did, literally, this weekend.

Thank you dear friends and thank you, God, for these dear friends!

Comments

Alison said…
Best job ever as a friend is to help that person realize the God given beauty that they posses but sometimes forget. It really is an easy job to help you realize your beauty. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again that YOU are enough! It’s ridiculous how enough YOU are. God has known that about you all along and your maroon wearing friends just a few decades now!! You DA Best!!!!

Popular posts from this blog

The Grief of a Stepmom

The grief of a stepmom.  This post has had so many titles:  The Invisible Grief of a Stepmom, The Silent Grief of a Stepmom, The Lonely Grief of a Stepmom. . . the grief of a stepmom is like no other grief because it feels so homeless. My stepson died a few weeks ago.   Marc and I have only been married eight months and Mackay, my stepson, lived in NYC and we rarely got to see him (he didn't get to come to the wedding or Cabo and didn't stay with us when he came to town), so I didn't have much of a relationship with him.  So there is a weird layer of loosing someone I hardly knew and I feel like that is the layer that makes the most sense to everyone.   While the family was mourning, I was the one organizing all of the meals coming in from our wonderful friends and neighbors, I was cleaning up one meal and setting up for the next.  I was keeping the house in order and making sure Marc was able to surround himself with the friends and family he needed to make it through the

Should've Said No. . . ?

Andy proposed during a curtain call of Me and My Girl , a musical in which he played an old man who went most of his life without telling the woman he loved that he loved her... Twenty-three years ago today Andy asked me to marry him. . . .  he was my best friend and I thought he was the love of my life.  Should I have said no? I don't know how many times I have now been asked a version of that question in the past couple of years and I cannot count the number of times I have asked myself that question over the past decade, but it is a dumb question with no great answer. If I would have said no 23 years ago, I would have saved myself from so many tears and so much pain, but I would have missed so much laughter and so many exciting firsts and I would be such a different person. . . . Because of this day, 23 years ago, I am who I am and I have so much to be thankful for. Because of this day, 23 years ago, I have five of the best kids on the planet.  They are t

Mother's Day Thoughts

I've been feeling so many Mother's Day feels this weekend.  For starters, my big kids came home to surprise me and that was the most wonderful thing!  I remember Mother's Day 2017 when I cried because Hays was a Senior in high school and heading to Texas A&M and I thought it would be my last Mother's Day with my five all together. . . . and yesterday proved those tears unnecessary!  And then, as if that wasn't more than I could ever wish for, Marc spoiled me like I have never been spoiled before.  I am consistently blown away and humbled by how much he appreciates me and shows me his appreciation with words, gifts, acts of service and more.  I am so grateful for this husband of mine and the way he loves me and shows our kids what selfless love is supposed to look like! But even before yesterday, I've been thinking a lot about all of the different dimensions of motherhood I now experience and it is shaping me into a new and stronger and more compassionate and