Solid as a Rock

My husband is visiting his best friends from college this weekend. I met all of these guys, including my husband, when I was eighteen years old. This middle stage of life is full of so much change – our elders are becoming more fragile, our kids are gaining independence at warp speed, and the wrinkles on my face are unfortunately appearing at warp speed, too. Yet, certain things, the most important things, don’t change at all. In fact these things, that stand taller and become more obvious beacons than ever, are the steadying rocks, in this big, swirling sea of change. The things that don’t change are the feelings that we have for each other and the memories that we share.

My husband’s best friend is the salt-of-the-earth. Everyone who meets him, loves him. He loves kids, he loves his friends, he loves animals, and he loves his wife, and he loves his family. This man loves life. He has been a firefighter since we were in college. He fought the fires that raged on the Pentagon on 9/11. This man was the best man in our wedding, but before my husband and I got to that step in our relationship, I got more than one lecture from my husband’s best friend that I had better be kind and take care of his “meatball.” (my husband) When I first met my husband’s best friend’s extended family – a large, raucous, always laughing, always smiling, always joking, always having each others’ back, Irish family, I knew, in an instant, that I wanted to have a family just like theirs.

Last night, my husband texted me a picture of him, with his best friend and his best friend’s wife, all encircled in a big embrace. The picture screams, LOVE. And it warms my heart to no end, to know, that in this big, sometimes overwhelming stream of constant transition and change, the solid rocks remain steady. And they always will.