Friends

I'm all over the place with this new blog.

I found out the other day that my best friend was chosen as a finalist for The Southern Humanities Review poetry contest and will be published in an issue in the near future. I don't know as much about poetry as I should and I don't know much about poetry contests or the pressure but I do understand that this is not something small. This contest was nation-wide. Not just the state of Alabama or even Auburn University, but the ENTIRE country. Southern Humanities Review has featured some of the best poets of the last 50 years. Again, this isn't a little feat. 

I'm so proud of him. So proud. He's super talented and over the last year, his writing has grown and matured. He's found his "voice" and his tone and style are so beautiful. I'm jealous. He's working hard between a full-time job and a full-time school schedule and yet still challenging himself to write and pursue this goal. It's exciting to see that he's starting his career and his life.

Richard is a good friend besides being a great writer. He's loyal and kind. He's also one of the first people I want to share things with because he's quick to listen and super slow to pass judgment.

If you read my last post, you can now understand more as to why I feel like I'm too boring to be called his friend. I'm raving and gushing about him because I'm finding myself getting destructive. He's not a friend I want to lose but I find too often this desire to push back. Be mean. Make him angry so that he'll get mad, then just go ahead and be done with me. I start fights over the smallest things and I always wonder will he fight for my friendship? Does he care? Over and over in my head I hear loudly, "You aren't worth fighting for...you have nothing to offer...you are not interesting or important." I can easily say that these are lies but hearing the truth over them is next to impossible. I'm also being a martyr, owning the hateful words and wearing them, hiding behind them and possibly becoming them. 

I don't want to be that girl anymore. I don't want to hurt people in order to feel validated. Forever ago I started reading Psalms and as I did, I kept up with God's promises, who the Word said that God was, and who the Word says I am. For some reason I stopped. I've learned lately that everything else will stay louder as long as I allow it. I want to hear truth and though I do have friends that constantly speak it to me, I need to hear it from the Lord. I also need to make things right with my friend. I apologize but I am sure that small tears are made with each fight and patience and love gets thinner and thinner. 

So, if anything is coming from these blog posts, its that I am typing myself to the truth that is already planted in my heart.  

Here's Richard. Now you know him.