Perspective…

Life has a way of consistently reminding us of the need to look through another person’s lens.

Perspective.

I’m not sure where I first learned its importance, but it is something I work to ensure I have in most everything I do.

And this effort usually leads me to an understanding that although we may end up at the same table, our path to getting there is rarely the same and even though we’re in the same place, we are sitting in different chairs.

The first time I laid eyes on my best friend, Katie, our middle school science teacher announced, ‘Katie, I hear Chuck Norris is staying at your hotel.’

WHAT?!

We were in the same classroom, with the same teacher, staring at the same Periodic Table chart, sitting in similarly looking desks…but our paths to getting there were not alike. AT ALL.

Looking at us, one would think we arrived on the same bus…Bongo jeans, brown- somewhat frizzy- hair, freckles, and even matching Revlon Rum Raisin lipstick.

But, I didn’t know Chuck Norris and I certainly didn’t own a hotel.

My only experience with hotels was during Daytona Beach’s early 1990s Spring Break…when I’d walk from my Mamaw’s house to Quality Inn hotel and spend my days cleaning rooms alongside her. Little Me cheerfully smiling, boasting that MY Mamaw was the housekeeper. Every college kid lovingly called her by her first name and left generous tips under their beer can pyramids.

Back in that middle school classroom…staring at Katie and her sparkly blue eyes I thought, ‘Her life must be absolutely perfect. She has it all.’

A week later, she invited me to one of her sleepovers. I didn’t know it at the time, but this invite was somewhat coveted and would lead to a wonderful group of girls for me to grow up with. I also didn’t know it would be in the apartment above her parents’ garage. Not only did she have a hotel- she had an entire apartment for sleepovers.

The preteen years with Katie brought me many firsts- lobster for Thanksgiving, rides in a Jaguar, openings of her family businesses and my first two jobs.

Those years also brought firsts for her- chocolate gravy and buttermilk biscuits, Southern fried chicken, a kitchen consistently full of aunts, uncles and cousins…and even a Mamaw.

Our lenses were different, but our hearts were the same…we wanted the same things.

Opportunity, kindness, respect, safety, love.

And a lifetime of friendship…

Katie’s Perspective:

After writing this, I asked Katie what some of her firsts were with me in our early years together. Without knowing what I was writing or what I’d already written, she sent the following in a voice text:

“You know I had such a small family. It was just me and my mom and dad since my brother was grown. I didn’t have sisters or cousins.

And I remember feeling somewhat jealous of your family because when I went over there, you had so many people and l- as a teenager- I didn't look at it like, ‘Holy crap, that's a lot of people living in one house.’ It was, ‘Wow, she has a grandmother who cooks every morning…really amazing food.’

You had all of these cousins and your uncles would take us on the four wheelers and it was so great.

Every time I drive by now, I use your old house as a brag with my kids and they're probably sick of me…every time we drive by…I’m going to cry…every time we drive by, I tell them, ‘Crystal grew up in that house’ and I kind of tear up. I’m proud of you.”