Ode to T

And funny as all hell.
-End

I know, that's not technically an ode, but today is T's birthday, and I am no Keats. 

We have been friends since diapers. Since before I can remember. Her father baptized my parents. Before my sister J was born. Her mother held J as my family was sealed together in the temple. T and her sister L were my first friends. She's been as long as I've had any sense of the world.

At BYU we went walking almost every night for almost a year (except when 24 was on - T couldn't miss). This periodically required multiple sweatshirts and jackets, we walked even in the dead of Utah winter.


Emails have been written every single weekday for years (except during illness or vacation). In 2012 we exchanged over 525 messages. Rarely brief, many reach three or four single spaced pages. I'm grateful she is willing to read all my ramblings and thoroughly advise. Almost everything I think about, she reads about. She sees the process before I've figured out the answer. At times she is called upon to provide the answer. There is no birthday gift I can give to equal that.

I'm honored she trusts me to read her life, hopes, dreams, disasters, and ridiculous moments. Work. Writing. Wonderful boyfriend M. T is amazing, and puts up with a lot from me - breakdowns, bad advice, crankiness, plain stupidity at times. She is always there to comfort, celebrate successes, support, and tell me to snap out of a funk. Laughs and cries with me. Her writing never fails to make me smile, often laugh hysterically. The best friend.

I'm aware how utterly lucky I am. I think of these lines from Anne of Green Gables,

"A bosom friend--an intimate friend, you know--a really kindred spirit to whom I can confide my inmost soul.  I've dreamed of meeting her all my life.  I never really supposed I would, but so many of my loveliest dreams have come true all at once that perhaps this one will, too.  Do you think it's possible?" - Anne, Chapter VIII

Happy Birthday T! I hope it is fantastic.

 T, K, and L. No idea what we are singing.

 Based on the look on my face this may have been the best moment of my life.

 L, A (who we visited in DC), K, and T.

M and 3 giants in the back. Several cropped out entirely.

Because, you know, we lived in Provo.

 Hiking in Utah.

Heading out on a walk, in the snow.

At Disneyland.

 Meeting niece Q.

In Cleveland for a previous T birthday.