Friends

I am still trying to process the month of March. I put up a post and took it down. An introvert, I have to think things through before I can really explain and write or speak about them.


The March post will go back up when its ready, with it's sadness, sweetness and glory. But not yet.


My youngest daughter and I were talking about friendships this morning, how different personalities need friends in different ways, but we all do. Her extrovert brother surrounds himself with a big group. She is happy with just a few close girlfriends. I hold tightly to my friends, even from long ago, value them, try to stay in contact. I tell my children--people are always more important than things, than status, than popularity. People are to be cherished.


Each stage of life has brought different relationships, and some stages have brought loneliness. Right now, as I am mostly at home and most of my contemporaries are busy with work and volunteer obligations--as I used to be--I often find myself at lose ends, wishing for more time with friends. 


And yet even now I have a small group of friends who intentionally make time for each other every week for Bible study, who years ago dropped our masks and sat down together to pray and share.  What would I do without them? 


Life is hard, difficult, joyful, even sometimes brutal. And it is not meant to be lived alone. 


What role do friends play in your life? If you have a chronic illness, how well or how much can you communicate about it with your friends?