Yellow Friendship

This is just a warning...this post is not like most of my others...this is a bit of my heart being laid out for the world...Mom, you may need a Kleenex...sorry! :o)

So, the title probably has most of you stumped...I'm betting that there is only one person out there that MIGHT know where I am headed...and I do mean MIGHT. Recently I have been trying to process and figure out a certain part of my life...the part of my life that has to do with friendships.

Friendships have always been a funny thing for me. I would like to think of myself as someone that makes friends easily. I think I am a very warm, upbeat kind of person...I love to get to know other people...love to help others...love to have fun...love to support...and most of all...love to love people. I am the kind of person that puts 200% of herself into her friendships. You might think that I am exaggerating...but ask my husband...it is true...I will rearrange the stars to make sure that I help a friend, make them feel loved, make them feel special, and let them know what an awesome person they are...often times while hurting myself in the process. The "funny" thing about me and friendships is that it seems like there always comes a time when someone just "disappears." Often times it has been the result of a move, a change in where we are at in this thing called life, or just loss of contact. I am always jealous of those girls who say, "Oh...we have been best friends since 3rd grade." I've never had that...not sure why...just never have.

Yellow Friendship is a friendship that first ended when she moved away to go to college down in San Diego...and unfortunately...ultimately ended with her passing. She always pops into my mind at the funniest times...it might be a song on the radio, a red mustang driving down the road, pep and cheer, anything related to Buchanan, and most recently, The Bachelorette. A guy we went to high school with was on the most recent season of The Bachelorette...and so, every Monday night, as I watched what was unfolding...I thought of her and what she was thinking of the whole situation. Ryan, you have to know that she was making fun of you the whole time. :o)

Blog world...meet Yellow Friendship...Alison Norcross.

Alison ad I became friends my sophomore year of high school. I made the Varsity Pep squad and she kind of took me under her wing. I am pretty sure that anyone who went to school with us would agree that you could never imagine a more opposite pairing...seems to be a "theme" in my life...you have met my husband right!?! She was loud, loved the center of attention, blunt, daring, and not afraid to speak her mind. Somehow we had a great friendship. She was the tall, blonde, outspoken one...and I was the quieter, sugar-coating, brunette.

The last time I saw her was at my high school graduation.She was a year older than me and she came all he way back to town to be there fo me. Once she moved away we lost touch. She was loving college life, tried to get me to come down and visit her...honestly...I was a little afraid of what I might find. It is safe to say, I wasn't one that had the "college experience"...and I certainly wasn't about it in high school.

I will never forget the day that I learned she had passed. I was in my classroom, before school, and a fellow teacher...and dear friend...came into my room and asked me if I knew Alison. I of course said, "yes," thinking that maybe she was in town and that I would have a chance to reconnect with her. Unfotunately she then told me that she had passed away, following a procedure to remove a brain tumor. In an instant I went numb. Granted I hadn't even seen Alison in six years...but it was so heartbreaking to know that she was gone. To know that I would never again have the chance to reconnect with her. To know that she had been sick and suffered...definitely not alone...but I still ached inside. My mom was so sweet and went with me to her service...where I cried like a baby...really...like a baby.

Looking back...Alison taught me so much about friendship. The most important thing she taught me was that a true friend likes you for who you are. As different as we were...and as much as I had to drive her crazy...she never once gave me grief about anything. If you knew Alison, you know that is pretty funny...she loved to give people grief for anything! :o) She always accepted me for the rule-following, sugar-coating, people-pleasing, nervous-nellie that I was...and still am.

One of the many memories I have of Alison is one night that I was supposed to spend the night at her house. Her parents were out of town. It was supposed to be a fun night with just a few girls. Pretty soon...more people showed up to her house...and I got the feeling that it was turning into a party. If you went to school with me you know...I NEVER went to a high school party...and I do NOT agree with teenage drinking. So, within about twenty minutes...I told Alison that I really didn't feel good...and I went home. I knew she knew. She knew that I wasn't sick. She knew that I wasn't okay with what was going on. But...she NEVER once said anything to me about it. NEVER gave me garbage for faking being sick...NEVER gave me garbage for not wanting to participate in the festivities. She knew, she respected my opinions, and she was still my friend...and I was still her friend.

Friends have come and gone since then...but none of them will ever be Alison. I laugh to myself when I wonder what she would say to me if I were able to share with her my most recent friendship struggle. I laugh because I know exactly what she would say. She would tell me to suck it up. Get over it. And stop letting someone bother me so much. Oh...and she would have two very choice words...but...I won't share them with you. :o)

So, that's what I am going to do...with the exception of the choice words of course!

Thank you everyone for your "words of wisdom" and thank you, Alison...for still bringing so much laughter to me. There will never be another person that gets me my only detention by a failed ploy to avoid running the mile, who sweet talks a male P.E. teacher into letting two girls leave school early everyother day so that we can race to the TCBY - eat a strawberry parfait - and make it back to pep practice, who comes to my house every Friday night before a competition to have my mom put three sponge curlers in her ponytail so that she is ready for competition the next day, whose nostrils flare whenever she laughs, and who convinces me that no one will ever know if we throw a pineapple off the balcony of a hotel room in Hawaii.

Yellow friendship...there will never be another one quite like you...but...thanks to you I am going to suck it up, pretend like things don't bother me...and try not to let people get to me so much. I have so many amazing people in my life...and I need to focus on them! :o)

So, again...I apologize for the change in mood...but I must say...I am feeling better! :o) Oh, and I just realized that I never explained why I call it Yellow Friendship...Alison was crazy about yellow in high school...in typical Alison fashion...she even had a custom made prom dress made one year...yellow sequence! :o)