Prior to my beautiful Daughter’s formal wedding this past Summer I had a difficult time with my own personal health. I feared seeing distant family and friends at the lavish affair and even more so dreaded the conversations I projected would happen between us after so much time apart.
This is when my micro-interaction with an old and dear friend of my Sister’s “saved the day”, as well as my attitude and helped me move forward in my life.
I had been care giving for my significant other for nearly 3 full years and a bit out of the loop on social media. The brief posts or texts I had been receiving from F&F were both creating fears and insecurities which were unreal. They merely existed in my mind. I shared this with my dear friend and as always, she paused a moment and then said, “I need more information”. I sent more details off to her regarding the estranged family and my current predicaments. She asked a few more questions and then with yet another one of Fran’s most profound “PT’s” (Passing Thoughts), she then replied. Not in jest, but with a totally sincere response rarer than the typical “why do you ask?”.
She told me when confronted by the pack of wolves which I did not run with to simply say “Aren’t you tired Miss Hilly?, Aren’t you tired?”
In other words, she advised me to turn the mean-hearted questions into a response with no need for them to reply! I laughed! I never used the line from the famous movie “The Help” which Fran suggested but just having it in my hip-pocket reduced my anxiety and my fears enough and I was able to dismiss the negativity before it even touched me and have the most wonderful day any Mother-of-the-Bride could have experienced! After all, it wasn’t about me.
I think back often of the famous men and women who over time have said profound statements which we just don’t hear enough of in our fast-paced and non-interactive society today. One which I ran across the other day written on the wall of a Health Sciences building, in my eyes, says it all.
“To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived: that is to have succeeded” Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Thank you to my Dearest Fran for being there to touch my life on such an important day! You changed my vision, my day and my world with just one micro-interaction. God Speed.