Friends

While I do have a Bonhoeffer paper to work on, I decided that I would write this down since it is all that is going through my head right now.

I have been thinking a lot about friends lately. Maybe it is because I miss my friends, maybe it is because my friends have been doing certain things that I have not been included on, maybe it is because I am going to miss another one of my friends bachelor parties because I have to preach on that Sunday….Whatever it is I have been thinking about it a lot lately.

I have many different circles of friends and they have overlapped a few times in my life. I have my friends from Rutland– two of which I am still close too. I have my friends from college. I only really talk with one friend who now lives in Cali — it kinda makes me sad that the rest don’t respond to e-mails or letters but I will get over it. I have my friends from camp — these are the friends that I consider my best friends and now I have my friends from seminary. I consider these some of my great friends as well and I know I will have these friends for a long time.

I am fusterated not with my friends from home or college or even seminary but I am fusterated because I can’t see/be with my friends from camp. It is crazy how much I need that interaction with them from time to time. And maybe there is more that I can do, I don’t know. But it seems like lately we have gone in our own directions. I know some are married and now I have a child (only one so far) and life is not like it was when we were 16 or even 20. I understand life changes but there was a certain time when I just felt that there was nothing that could separate us. To an extent that is true and it is more true for some than others. I guess we all have priorities and I never thought that mine would not put my friends near the top of the list.

My question is has seminary taken my friends away from me? Between my family and seminary and work — does that mean that I can’t make time for them? It is hard because there is not only the time factor of trying to get work done and school done and everything else that life demands but there is also the distance factor, some of my friends are a 5 -6 hour car ride and others are a 5-6 hour plane ride. It just seems crazy that this could separate us……

When I sit down recently and think about the stuff that “Bothers” me and sometimes I think that seminary takes the “fun” out of faith for me. I think the thing that my heart longs for the most might not be the faith interaction that I have with the kids or adults that I come in contact with. Even though that is a big thing — I think it is also the relationships that comes with working at camp. It is the nights out, the days off, the goofing off while stealing a 7 foot sign 30 feet up in the air. I miss the long nights talking on the beach or in the dining hall. I miss the hugs and faces of pure pleasure and the thoughts that this is a never ending friendship. I miss knowing that if there is anything that I need, at any time during the day I can call these guys up knowing that they would be at my doorstep ready to fight without any questions asked.
While I don’t fully believe that is gone, sometimes that seems like a distant memory.

Soon I will be celebrating the marriage of one of my friends. It is going to be good to see everyone again, I know that the weekend is going to be full of stories, memories remembered and new ones made. But I hope that sometime soon there will be more opportunities to bask in the glory of friendship, of faith in eachother and love for one another. I hope that I can fill this heart that is not broken, but maybe has a few holes where love and REason once made a home.