My two Saras - Part I

Ever find that friend that you think about every day no matter where they are geographically or in their life? I have several of those and two of those girls happen to share the same name. I think about each of them every day for different reasons. One of them walked into my life unexpectedly, for a short amount of time and needed to leave for her own reasons and the other I sought out myself expecting just to have a few questions answered and landed with a friendship that is very precious to me despite it's odd circumstances. Here are their stories...

The Queens of Awkward Situations

One night my husband and I were walking along in Home Depot after we had been together for about two years and we hadn't had the talk about the exes in our lives yet. I don't remember why I decided to ask him in Home Depot of all places about his ex, he or I could have said something that reminded him of her and he decided to share the story with me. This happens quite a bit in our marriage, we're not shy about sharing stories with each other even if it regards our exes because we're secure with our relationship and understand that our exes helped to shape our lives. So, I'm doing the wife thing and asking him tons of questions about Sara. I even think I got upset at him for saying something about her that I thought was wrong. He did the typical guy thing and got irritated that I was playing the 20 question game with him and said "Why don't you send her an email or something if you want. She'll answer your questions." 

So I did. I sent her an email explaining to her who I was, gave her some background, and I think I asked her some questions about their relationship or about herself. The answers I was getting from Jeff just gave me this nagging feeling that her and I were a lot alike and I really wanted to know more. She of course was SHOCKED to hear from me, of all people, but was very candid with her response. We started out sharing our personal stories about our own lives and of course we talked about Jeff, how she saw him, how he behaved in their relationship, how he hurt her and loved her. Many people think, how can you absorb this and not feel jealousy or dislike for this person? I know there were times I did get jealous of their relationship pieces, however, they ended up being things that I needed to look at myself and address as insecurities. Luckily, we both came to realize that we are two girls who have had our own experience with the same guy and didn't let the jealousy get in the way of our own friendship. 

Over the years, we built our friendship through words..."novels" as we call them. We write 10 to 20 page novels to each other sharing our lives with each other, sharing our childhoods, our love lives, our marriages, our woman moments, and of course the light of our lives, our children. Each of us learning a lesson through our stories. Sara is definitely a lot better at getting back to me than I am and my goal is to make sure I get a novel to her every month but I hear the girl can type RIDICULOUSLY fast, and if she's pissed...LOL. For me, hearing Sara's stories were like looking into a mirror and hearing myself talk. I could relate to her and understood exactly how she felt about things and why she did things because, well, I'd do them the same way. Over the years, if I have an issue, she's one of the first people I think about when wanting to share my problems because we are so much a like and we have always been very frank and honest in our conversations. We've had to be to continue our friendship. If we had let our emotions get in the way of our friendship, I don't think it would have lasted.

We've had the chance to meet each other, twice now. Yes, Jeff was there and what's even funnier is that the love of her life ended up being a friend of Jeff's and also one of Jeff's mom's employees. The first meeting was  a lot awkward and the second meeting was not bad at all. Her and I were ok, but the guys had some issues they had to sort out. Of course it's awkward to see your ex after 10 years so there was that element and then the friend married to the friend thing that needed some priming but the boys worked through it and everything is golden at this point. She is scheduled to move out near our family in the next six months and I could not be more excited! EEEEK! We both have already told the boys that "YES! We will be hanging out...A LOT!" Hell, we do the same things...we both love to run, love to write, love to talk, love to dance, and love to just live life. The simple things to us are what it's all about with little curve balls here and there.

Our friendship is one that I cherish because it's real, it's honest, it's emotional, and by all means unique because of the circumstances. I think that people come in to our lives for certain reasons and the way Sara and I look at it, Jeff was the catalyst for the relationships her and I have gained. Through Jeff, she gained a wonderful husband and a great friend and I can definitely say that I gained the same things.

"What is a friend? A single soul in two bodies."  -Aristotle