Memories

A few weeks ago a friend (Ruth) from my shadowy past, came back into my life via FaceBook.  And yesterday we had a chance to get together over dinner and relive a few memories.  It was exceptionally fun, at least for me. 

But, I could not get to sleep until 3 am!  Yeah Sleepless in Blog-landia.

You see, I remembered her extremely well from my early Christian days when I was honestly trying to get my act together, but honestly nothing from before that.  Thankfully, God had removed those memories from my mind.  (You have NO idea how those years tormented me!)  So, I was extremely shocked when she mentioned something from high school!  She had known me in high school?  OMG!  Do I apologize or just slice my throat and end it all!  Yeah, I was really a work of art in my pre-Christian days (daze...) - which covered all of high school and the following summer before God was able to crack through my thick skull during the fall of 1973.

And, as I lay in bed for hour after hour, I started to remember stuff I had forgotten for over 35 years.  Which made me more and more depressed.  Those high school years really sucked.  Honestly, Ruth was actually one of the few bright memories from those early years in America.  And the more I thought about it, the more tales came into mind of our years together running amuck, with a whole lot of others in Amuck-land.  Then I realized something I never could have back then, she had been a real friend but I was too blind to even understand what friendship was in those days.  She was someone I trusted, someone I enjoyed hanging around with - because ........ well this young woman was willing to actually talk to the very troubled odd duck of the school.  Mind you she was very much the exception!  Yeah, in my senior class, I was voted "Most Likely To".  Likely to what, I had asked.  Likely to succeed, likely to fail, likely to do almost anything.  I was a total enigma to those of my school.  Of course, no one there actually had taken the time to know me.

So with this flood of memories, I am delighted to have found her again.  I am delighted to see she has herself an impressive Christian husband.  I am delighted she is still the same Ruth I had known so many years ago.

There is an openess and transparency which comes with real friendship and was reborn last night.  I guess God knows what He is doing when He dredges up something from my past and it actually turned out to be positive.

And mind you, that is amazing to me - to rediscover one's past may not have been as hopeless as one remembered.