Sometimes You Just Need To Lend A Roller Skate.
Have you ever tried to skate with just one roller skate?
Ok, are you old enough to even know what roller skate are? If not imagine a roller blade or perhaps an ice skate.
Skating with one roller skate is not ideal. And technically you can’t skate on just one roller skate. But you can get by, get around, and get from point A to point B.
I grew up going to school in The City. We called it “The City”. You probably know it better as San Francisco. My childhood school experience is much, much different than what my kids know today.
We didn’t have grass and fancy playground equipment. Both of the elementary schools I attended were on busy city streets. At one of the campuses, we had to walk around the block each day to the neighborhood park to have recess.
From Kindergarten to Second Grade, I went to a school that stood three floors high with a garage on the bottom floor and a concrete playground. There was just concrete, a tether ball and foursquare. (And guess what? We were all perfectly happy with that.) During lunch and recess the garage would be closed off and anyone who brought their roller skates from home, could skate in the garage, with it’s nice smooth floors, during lunch recess.
At the time I thought nothing of it. Looking back at it now, I find it pretty comical. If a friend forgot their skates or didn’t have a pair, there was always a friend ready to lend them one of their skates. Each friend would kind of limp around on their one skate while everyone else rolled past them. Everyone had fun, even the one-skaters. It was not a big deal to give up one of your skates so everyone could join in. It wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t ideal, but it got the job done. I wouldn’t have to give up one of my skates every time we roller skated. But there always seemed to be someone who was willing to help out their skateless friend.
What a perfect picture of friendship.
Our friends are moving to Michigan and everyone is helping out. Some people are coming to help them get their house ready to sell by painting, packing and making repairs, etc. Some of the help being offered is physical; but help is coming in other ways, too. Help is coming in the form of phone calls and hugs encouraging them as they do this huge, brave thing. While some friends are giving gift cards to help with expenses. Leaving your friends and family to move across the country is hard and everyone is doing their small part to help in the transition.
Sometimes friends need you to drop everything and give everything they have to help. These are emergency situations. And let me tell you, these dear friends are the first ones to drop everything and help others. I’ve felt so blessed to help them in any small way. They’ve blessed our family many times over.
But usually what we need, in the day to day of life, is just to have friends come along and do life with us.
To give that afternoon to help you pack. To bring the kids over to a friend’s house, even if you have just an hour, to have a mom chat and let them play. To send a text asking for prayer and having a small group of your prayer warrior friends text you back saying they will pray. It doesn’t take long to text back, just a few minutes.
Sometimes, you just need to lend one of your skates.
It’s not about friends coming to rescue you, solve all your problems or be your emotional security blanket (though there are some times that call for this). Sometimes, well, really most of the time, it’s about friends coming alongside another friend and saying, “Let’s do this stuff together.” Because let’s face it; we all have “stuff”.
“Let’s pray about this together.”
“Let’s vent for a bit and just get it off our chest.” Just having a friend listen is what we need a lot of the time.
“Let’s have a girl’s night, eat nachos and laugh, really hard.” This may not happen very often; but it does need to happen.
“Let’s sign up our kids for swim lessons together.” It’s just for a half hour twice a week; but we can connect for half an hour.
You know how I know who my tribe is? They are the ones I feel comfortable with texting as I wait in my hospital robe for my turn at the old boob smasher machine. Getting a mammogram is at the bottom of any list of “things I’d like to do today”.
I just need a few gals to get that and laugh through it with me.
This was the actual text conversation I had not long ago as I waited for my mammo.
Me: Getting ready to get my boobs smashed. “Fun times for me!” (code for:” I hate this. So tell me it’s going to fine.”)
Friend:” Ha! Are you texting us while you are doing it?” (code for:” I’ve been there. It’s no fun; but you’ve got this.”)
I’ve always thought of friendship as a two way street; but it’s not a 50/50 deal. Some times it 30/70 (or 40/60, you get the point). Sometimes I’m on the 30% side and sometimes I’m on the 70% side. It’s always fluctuating because life is always fluctuating.
It can be challenging to nurture relationships when you have your family and work that get your attention first. But, you don’t have to give every ounce of yourself! You don’t have to exhaust yourself just to be a good friend. Just be willing to let people in and then walk through the messy stuff together.
Just give them one of your skates.
Some days, they’ll be giving you one of theirs.
