Friday

It was raining large fat drops this morning as I rushed from the car to the house. The uncleaned, fallen leaves were clogging up the gutters again (obviously my responsibility) and the water sploshed over in sheets making the sidewalk more of a hazard, so I stayed on the grass. The front door was locked and without a key I knocked. No answer. So deftly reaching over I knocked on Chuck's window. He opened the door, sleepy eyed and tousel haired. A brief "unh" rumbled from him as I lumbered in with a chirpy, "good morning!"...and headed for the kitchen to start a quick cup of tea followed by a hot bath and bed.

Sleep was four hours and tumultous. The night shift had been long. The only shift worked this week having been cancelled the other three. It wasn't bad really. Lax enough to sit at the computer and finish the required CareLeaning (ceu's) for the hospital. For OSHA. For whatever. Lax enough to talk to Matt about his upcoming nuptials, about his engagement to Julie over Christmas. Oh he is funny, he is and it was a mere two years ago when I, broken, had walked these halls and cried and cried and he, also broken at the time, had begun a destructive cycle of 'living'. "Oh man, you need Jesus." I told him at the time, knowing instinctively and yet not feeling so much of it myself. He laughed but nonetheless I prayed for him. Prayed for him a wife or a way out of his destructive pattern though he swore up and down that he would never marry again (having divorced nine years earlier). Prayed for him and didn't tell him. Then when this old 'friend' from school and he began 'seeing' each other.."Just friends dude.."..."Yeah, right.." and I rolled my eyes as Paula and I laughed. He continued to deny, deny anything serious even as she told him she loved him and he began to put the brakes on it..(he is like me, we tend to sabotage relationships..it takes a strong person to stay..and really, who wants to?)..For him, she did. And he saw her worth. She may not have been the skinny boobsy thing he usually went for but she was solid. She cared. She hung around. She moved in. She was there. Above all, she was and is, nice and she loves him.

When her grandmother made him a quilt Paula and I smiled (instigators always) and quietly chuckled. mm-hm..When they had dinner with both sets of parents we giggled, yea-ah...When he started talking in that settled mm-hmm-know-all-about-it relationship way.. I thought, yes!

Last night Matt was standing at his car as I pulled into the parking garage, he had also just arrived. We exchanged hellos and how are yous. "Well I got engaged over Christmas."...(EEK!!!).."OMG, congratulations!!"..as I giggled adding..."You have to tell me all about it tonight."...And so, in the hours after midnight, during the brief downtime between charts and assessments and general distractions, he did. Lisa and I heard the sweet story. He smiled telling it as if remembering.....

They will marry sometime in September. Puerto Rico is their first choice.  There are those of us who have attended all the weddings of our cohorts, and then those who have attended some: Stacy and Dan, Paula and her husband Chris, Matt, me and Lisa and of course, Amber and Dani and their respective spouses... We have been there at the weddings. We have drank and danced. We have laughed. Will we fly to Puerto Rico? We joke with Matt that we will. It is doubtful but 2011 will tell.

"What a happy and holy fashion it is that those who love one another should rest on the same pillow." Nathaniel Hawthorne.