Jason and I had attended UU Arlington for a few years, although we never felt connected there, and neither did the kids. We found ourselves becoming holiday-only churchgoers, which disappointed me because I really wanted my kids to learn the beauty of church, its rhythms and sounds, and to feel at home there. We were driving home one day when Jason saw a big sign on a church just across the street from the Arlington UU (and thus within walking distance of our house). It said: Strawberry Festival!

Now, Poteet, Texas, where my dad is from, is (you may not know) the Strawberry Capital of Texas, and has an awesome strawberry festival. Jason said: “Just like Poteet! Let’s go!” So, one Saturday, we set off. Once there, we were completely enraptured, entranced, embraced by a strawberry festival entirely unlike any we had expected. It was tiny: Maybe 50 people, and the children, who had so disliked the UU church that we had to teach nursery just so they wouldn’t scream, immediately ran off and started playing with the (very simple) toys they had out.

A woman, Donna, was blowing bubbles with string that the children could actually walk through (which popped them, of course), and they had a race track set up off a couple of folding chairs that Oliver took to immediately. Hot dogs were $1, and they had strawberry shortcake for sale.

I started talking with a man, Art, and a very young woman holding a teensy, tiny baby (I was three months pregnant with Eleanor at the time) named Kristen. When Kristen moved on to chat with others, Art said, “she’s our new head pastor — she started two months ago, just before her daughter was born.” He kept talking, and I could tell he wasn’t trying to recruit me — he was just making a genuine connection.

Judy and the kids from Allyson’s class still send her cards in the mail. Aren’t they fabulous?

After I expressed interest, he did invite us to church, telling us that it was a small congregation, about 20 people. We felt so inspired by the fun and warmth at the Saturday festival that we went back the very next day. Not only was the church filled with warmth, when Jason walked Oliver and Allyson downstairs and said, “I think I might head back up,” Allyson said, without even looking at him, “I think you should, Dad.”

Furthermore, at the (wonderful, welcoming) coffee hour after the service, I met Judy, Art’s wife. Quiet and … real … my highest compliment, she was warm and tender without being overly either. She asked about our children, and I asked about hers. She talked about the two with her that day (one, Janna, has become a close friend), and the one in North Carolina. Then I said, “so you have three children? We will, too!” and she said, quietly and with great love and heartache, “no, I have four children, my daughter Erica died three years ago.”

All three of our children were baptized at Bethel, when Eleanor was just days old.

Trying to write about Art and Judy, about their love for us and our family, for Bethel and the entire church there, is like trying to capture the very best of what Christianity is. Trying to express their dignity and grace at living fully after losing part of their heart and soul — well, words fail.

Art and Judy welcomed our entire family so warmly to Bethel that first weekend, and continued as spiritual and heartfelt guides to us in the years to come. Judy was Oliver and Allyson’s first real teacher. Art’s inspired photographs lit up the children (Art isn’t in any photos I have, because he was always behind the camera).

I am so overwhelmed with tenderness just thinking of all that I have to thank Art and Judy for. They helped us transform our family and our lives, and we are forever in their debt. I am infinitely richer for knowing you.

In my junior year I asked Jeff Wilkinson to the Rebelette Ball, a dance where the girls traditionally asked the boys.

That was the year I was an officer, and the officers always walked up on a bridge with their dates, one from one side and one from the other. For long-time girlfriend/boyfriend pairs, it was an opportunity to be in a passionate clinch while being cheered by hundreds of guests. For a first date, it was an exercise in awkwardness.

Jeff came up one side of the bridge, I came up the other. I thought it was going to be a perfect moment to exchange a chaste kiss, he thought it was the perfect moment to show them all we were super cute. He came in for passion, I came in for a peck, it was: Awkward. We made it  through the rest of the night, but only just.

I still really liked him, but was too embarrassed to figure out next steps. We didn’t speak for a bit, after that. Then, out of the blue, things started appearing in my mailbox at home.

First, a golden Buddha, stuck out of the mailbox with a note attached, “To Liza, from Anonymous.” Honestly, I probably still have the notes somewhere, but have not found them tonight. Then, a gift card to a CD store, $25!, a not insignificant sum of money. I was starting to get flattered, and my friends and I were really enjoying playing a game of “guess who” the anonymous gifts were from.

I went to the record store and purchased an Elton John CD — my taste in music as impeccable then (ha) as now (my husband shudders in agreement). Anyway, the gifts kept coming, and finally I realized (through careful handwriting analysis, and then asking Jeff outright) that they were from Jeff. I was so flattered and happy that my awkward response to his bridge-kiss hadn’t ruined our chances, and so honored that he had gone to such trouble to court me.

We started dating again. We continued off and on for a few years, and had some really happy memories mixed in there. From beach trips to prom dinner, from painting the walls of his room in red, white and blue stripes to making chocolate chip cookies together in 10 minutes flat — we laughed a lot together. We went off to college, and although our dorms were right next to each other, the magic didn’t continue for much longer.

Another Blue Ball, one year later. Look at our matching hair!

Young love is so exquisite, so alive and painful, so raw — I’m glad I got to experience it with a gentleman like Jeff Wilkinson. Thanks, Jeff.

My mom is a rule follower, my dad plays with the edges of the rules but tends to stay inside the lines, and I’ve always been pretty rigid about ‘right,’ ‘wrong’ and the non-negotiable space in between. A bit of a buzz kill, actually, always ready to lecture you if I disagree. Going back another generation, my grandmother Willa Mae was definitely a rule follower, always saving money for retirement, teaching kids the right way to read and write as an elementary school teacher, and speaking clearly for right and wrong.

And then, wildly, out of the blue, in a way that completely disarmed and charmed almost every single person he ever met in his far-too-short life, was Uncle Erwin, my father’s older brother. Uncle Erwin was smart — with a masters in divinity from Trinity University. He was handsome — class president, Poteet High School. He was popular, he was kind, and my goodness he would do anything for a good time, for a few bucks, for an adventure.

Jennei, Granny, Mamaw and me in back, with Mom, Dad and Erwin at our house in Houston. See the smiles? Everyone always laughed helplessly when Erwin was around.

My dad loves to tell how he worked his tail off one summer, double shifts at every job you could get, to offer Erwin $200 for his half of the 1936 Hudson he and Erwin had inherited from their Uncle Clyde. Erwin took one look at the pile of money and agreed. He was endlessly patient, endlessly kind, and endlessly willing to raise a ruckus in the name of fun.

I only knew him as a child — he died when I was 16, in 1990, of AIDS — but the stories my dad tells fill me with admiration, envy and terror. What do you mean he spent his last money flying to Mexico, and then made a friend who took him home to his mom, who fed him and sheltered him and became his life-long friend? What do you mean he tried drugs? How could he teach English as a second language at Columbia University, and also be a preacher at a tiny, tiny church in Harlem in the late 1980s? How could he so bravely embrace life without fear? He came over to my mom’s house once, after her divorce from dad, and gave her one of the latest things from NYC — a PAPER JACKET. I know now it was probably made out of an early form of Tyvek, but to us, in 1980s Houston, it was like a gift from another planet.

How could he be at home in Poteet, Texas, growing up gay in the 1950s? How could he find family wherever he went — how could he trust the world would care for him, even if he didn’t worry about it (like I do)? I’ll never know the answers, he was gone far too soon for me to ask, but I like to teach Oliver (Erwin), Allyson and Eleanor that they don’t HAVE to follow all the rules, and they should try to fly more often than I do — the world tends to catch you.

My personal favorite Uncle Erwin story comes from when we were pretty young. Dad and Nancy were married, and we were in Poteet visiting Mamaw. Erwin flew in from NYC, like Santa and the world’s best adoring uncle wrapped into one, and Dad took us all out to dinner. That meant Dad, Nancy, Jennei (12?), Carol (11?), me (10?) and Anna (8?) as well as Erwin and Mamaw. We went to a very fancy Mexican restaurant in downtown San Antonio, that my dad hates to this day (‘tourist trap,’ he’ll mutter good-naturedly, as we stroll by).

We sat on the patio, at a round table, and there were lights strung across the patio. It was beautiful, and we were all high on Erwin’s presence. He loved to play to an adoring crowd (who doesn’t?) so one thing led to another. I don’t remember the food, I don’t remember what was said, but I know that the four of us girls were laughing so hard at Erwin’s antics that our stomach hurt, and my dad, who was DETERMINED to give us a fancy dinner, was getting more and more irritated.

By the end of dinner, my adored and beloved dad was RIGID with anger, and even though I was sad I was making him mad I couldn’t NOT be a part of Erwin’s adoring fan club. In my memory, the four girls and Erwin left the restaurant ahead of the group (honestly, Erwin might even have called them squares, but I may be making this up) and strolled along the river walk, laughing all the while.

The joy of being bad, of disobeying even just a bit, and doing it with an adored and adoring adult, was intoxicating. To realize that you could misbehave and the world would keep turning: A revelation. I have so many things to say to and ask of my Uncle Erwin, but first among them is: Thank you. You lived your life bravely and boldly, and I have always admired your courage.

My best friend Pam and I are flying to a mid-point in the country to spend a much-needed girls weekend together. Where are we meeting? Kansas City, a place I’ve never been but that holds two people I love very much.

Pam is the daughter of Merrily and Lebert Shultz, two wonderful people in Kansas City. Ever since meeting them, years ago, they have opened up their hearts and their generosity to me. I was looking for pictures to post with this blog, and found the gifts they have given me (awesome sweaters), Oliver (his first sippy cup, metal of course), and the organic, silk blanket they sent Allyson when she was born. This post is specifically to thank Merrily for the handmade blanket she knitted Eleanor when she was born.

Allyson’s blanket sent by the Shultz’s.

For at least the past six years, whenever Pam’s parents came to Baltimore to visit her and her family, we’d make a point of meeting between DC and Baltimore (at a place oddly named Savage Mill) for dinner and a walk. Talking politics with her father, catching up on Merrily’s projects and beloved Westies, was always wonderful. And, continuing their theme of generosity, they always insisted on buying, even as our family grew and grew.

One time, they babysat when Pam and Chris went out of town, and we still met up in the middle — it was a wonderful time.

Merrily, an advanced and skilled seamstress, knitter and outfit creator extraordinaire, always makes sure to thank me for being there for Samantha’s birth (see earlier post). As we were preparing for our beloved third baby, turning our den into a third bedroom; getting the crib set up; cleaning the baby girl clothes — Merrily was working hard on a gift of wonderful beauty.

Jason holding both our girls wrapped in the beloved blanket.

Almost the day Eleanor arrived, a package was in the mail: A handmade blanket, in a wonderful rainbow of colors, just for our baby girl. We wrapped her in it immediately, and she still carries it with her everywhere almost 2 1/2 years later — ‘my blanket! where my blanket, daddy?’

It’s beautiful, it’s handmade, and wrapping Eleanor in its warmth every day reminds me of Merrily’s skills and love. I can’t wait to see her, Lee and wonderful Kansas City tomorrow. Thanks, Merrily.

Ron Rogers and I dated in high school for, roughly estimated, 1 minute. Our friendship has lasted many decades longer than that, and he is one of the high school friends I talk to with some regularity.

And in the crazy way that life works, we now live in the same state — he has been in Spokane for more than a decade. After I got the job in Seattle, I called him and said, “we should see each other more than every decade or so when you are on the east coast. We’re so certain about it, in fact, that we are moving to Washington.”  We haven’t connected in person yet, but it’s nice to know someone just over the mountains …

Ron has helped me across many of life’s crossroads. In 2006, I biked across the country from Seattle to Washington, D.C. (leaving for this trip was the last time I was in Seattle until I interviewed for the job here). Three days into the trip, as we approached Spokane, on a wide, clear sunny day on a wide, clear road, a driver turned around to talk to her infant, and killed one of the cyclists on our ride.

When we learned of the tragedy, as a group, a few miles later, we didn’t know what to do and many of us just kept pedaling, stunned and shocked, until we arrived in Spokane. We met as a group, and then I gratefully retreated to Ron’s house. Having the distance to talk through it with Ron and his then-girlfriend, now-wife Tammy was a saving grace for me — floating in their pool, playing with their dogs, eating out with them. After a rest day in Spokane, I reluctantly left to start the journey again.

I’m pretty certain Ron and I broke up after 4 minutes, but we did manage to get a picture … ah, high school. Believe it or not, we were at the terribly named Blue Ball.

Ron has also shaped my life in other ways over the years. When, near the end of college,  I debated being an editor or a flight attendant, Ron very frankly said, “Good question, Liza. Do you want to be an editor or a WAITRESS. IN. THE. SKY.?” Asked that way, the choice seemed much clearer, and I went the editor route.

But it’s not all sage advice and words of wisdom. Ron is also the person who made me go to see Dumb and Dumber in college, and then ruined the perfectly good Air Force One (while he was serving in the Air Force) by LOUDLY proclaiming: “A PLANE doesn’t DRIVE like that” at several points during the movie. AND, in his biggest failing, he didn’t recognize the incomparable beauty of my Daffy Duck impression in high school.

After I started dating Jeff and Ron started dating Amy, we would sometimes double date, or go out together in a larger group. One of these outings involved gathering at my house and playing charades. I am very competitive, and find those group games high pressure. My team wanted to win, and I drew the card: Daffy Duck.

In a panic, with the timer running, I realized that I could BE Daffy Duck. I squatted down, started waving my back end from side to side while holding my two hands in front of my mouth like a (very clear to my mind) beak. I waddled around the room, making a quacking gesture (but not sound) growing more and more impatient with their ignorance in the face of my OBVIOUS cues. We didn’t win. Both teams were laughing too hard to even guess — and that image has stayed so strong with Ron over the years that when a new AFLAC ad came out recently he texted me: “They are doing your impression!”

Not only was he right — but it was CLEAR to me that they were imitating Daffy, and I’m STILL irritated that he didn’t guess.

A friend like Ron, one who laughs with me and talks frankly to me and shares stories with me, is a large part of my hope and belief in the world. Thanks, Ron.

I seriously had to look up how to spell Vicki’s name correctly, because one of our longest running jokes was on a TERRIBLE misspelling of her name on our Rebelette uniforms. Instead of Vicki Ogburn, they monogrammed Vick-Y OSBOURNE. They got about 6 letters right, and we turned it into a song: Vick-Y, Osbour-Nee, Vick-Y, Osbour-Nee. Maybe you had to be there?

Me in full officer Rebelette regalia …

I think that’s the point of so much of my friendship with Vicki: You had to be there. We met our freshman year of high school, in Rebelettes. This was … a very Texas institution, wherein young women marched on the field of football games in various formations, like a marching band, except we did also have a band at Westbury. Rebelettes played either a trumpet, a drum, or … yes, a xylophone, reserved for the least musically talented members. I was a proud xylophone player, as was Vicki. Our junior and senior years, we were officers in the … squad? … and bonded  deeply.

But before that, before we were officers, before we schemed how to sell more candy so we could buy more candy so we could eat more candy to support the Rebelettes (it was kind of a vicious cycle), we were friends. And our friendship was easiest to explain in helpless, ridiculous, uncontrollable laughter.

I specifically remember one day when Jeff (high school boyfriend), Long, Vicki and I were at my house. I was trying to show off my culinary skills, and decided to make homemade macaroni and cheese. It was … not successful. It was homemade macaroni and soup. It was a liquid disaster. There are many people that would be bummed about this, and I include myself in that number: If Vicki weren’t around. But she was, and it quickly went from a debacle to one of the funniest things that had happened in my life.

I always looked goofy around Vicki because I was laughing so hard .. here we are doing important Rebelette work …

I don’t remember the specific thing she said, but I do recall —that I actually laughed so hard that macaroni came out of … my nose. It was … uncomfortable. It burned. But the laughter around it — the idea that a failed ‘fancy’ dish was not a disaster but an opportunity to bring us together in laughter and failure — was a warm and wonderful feeling.

Another example: At an ‘officers retreat’ to town of San Antonio, we stayed in a Motel 6. As young girls out in the world with little supervision are wont to do, we turned our 4-person room into a pretty wild slumber party, with jumping on the bed and general hysterics. Our teacher stormed into the room — not the short one, Ms. Burnette?, but the tall skinny one, Ms. ? I’m blanking — and dressed us down sharply. She ended her rebuke with, “This is NOT how you behave in a hotel,” and then turned on her heel and left the room.

Vicki, without missing a single beat, turned to us and said, “I may not know everything, but this is a MOTEL, not a HOTEL, and I think the standards of behavior are different.” Again, you may have had to be there, but instead of feeling small and chagrined, I remember laughing harder than I’ve ever laughed. I also still clarify the difference for hotels vs. motels with my children … it’s just too funny not to keep the joke going.

Vicki was also being raised in high school by a single mom, a strong, independent nurse. She had a beloved kid sister, and I had an older sister. We had a lot in common — and what I am most grateful to her for across all these years are the lessons she taught me in perspective. The hard parts of life are a lot easier if you can find something to laugh about in them. I lift a spoonful of macaroni to toast you, Vicki. Thanks.

Holly Acree was a dear friend of mine in high school. We met at church, bonded in choir, and spent many, many days together. I mainly remember being at her house, but that might be because I enjoyed it there so much. I loved mowing her lawn (not my own, of course), I loved being included in her family with her mom and her sister, Lisa, and I mostly loved listening to and talking with Holly. We also traveled a lot together, with our church, and were both SUPERSTARS of a traveling musical (superstar might overstate it) that involved us wearing really awful baggy red shorts all over Texas and Arkansas. 

She was a really big superstar soccer player in high school (she may be still today), and yet she just looked like anyone else — until she made a muscle with her leg. Her leg showed muscles that I hadn’t seen — certainly not in a girl — before, and that I loved to see. Her dedication to soccer, to the time, the pain and the learning, was wonderful to see. I admired her for it enormously. 

She also had a great sense of fun — with bright red hair and a fantastic smile (see photo), I loved being around her. We were both children of single mothers, at that point, and had a lot of freedom. I loved painting other people’s rooms (mine remained an anodyne peach for my entire middle and high school career) in a dramatic way. Holly and I decided that her room would have one forest green wall with pink and (white?) splatter paint, and the rest white walls with pink and green splatter paint. Sponge paint, splatter paint, ‘textures’ were all the rage, and we didn’t let our complete lack of information or skill dissuade us.

One day, and I’m almost certain her mom wasn’t home, we set to it. I *think* (hope?) that we taped off the room and used plastic covers, but I know we moved all the furniture to the middle of the room. We did the ‘boring’ part first, painting a wall a dark green. Then: We went to work. We started splattering just the walls, but soon the splatter turned to each other. I remember standing on her bed, covered in pink and green paint, laughing so hard my stomach hurt. 

I don’t remember the clean up — surely we did — or her mom’s reaction. I remember the glee we felt in the moment, the comfort with each other, and the pure love of being with someone doing something a bit unusual that we both enjoyed. Out of all the happy memories I have with Holly, that day remains one of my favorites. 

When we have gotten in touch over the years, Holly makes a point of telling me how much I affected her life. I appreciate it, and yet I always feel she affected mine in more ways. She showed me it was okay for a woman to be physically strong, to stand up to men, and to speak loudly when I felt strongly. She taught me how to love without hesitation, and I am grateful to her for those and many others. Live it to the max, right, Holly? Thank you. 

So no post about the Poteet farmhouse, and what it means to me and my kids, can start without my great-grandfather’s idea about the house. My grandparents had longed to be farmers, and had been searching for a spot for a while. They found this land, about 162 acres (my dad is GUARANTEED to be mad I got the number wrong, but I can never remember the exact acreage!), with a house on it, and bought it back in 1945. This was Erwin and Willa Mae Preston, with one son (Erwin, Jr.) already born and my dad coming a year later. Willa Mae’s dad came to visit, and took a good look around the house. He said, with a sense of humor that my dad inherited down to the delivery, “Nothing wrong with this house, Willa, that a couple of sticks of dynamite couldn’t fix. Throw them into the fireplace, get the stone out of the house, and start over. Then you’ll have a nice home.”

They didn’t do that, and the iron above the door spelling out the builder’s name, a Mr. Sherman, is still there from the late 1800s. My grandparents raised my dad and his brother there, and then moved to the big city of Poteet (“the big shitty,” in my Papaw’s parlance). In my childhood, we visited them in their house in Poteet, just under the strawberry water tower, and only went to the farm to indulgence my dad’s nostalgia. Every time he dragged us out there, he had to debate if he wanted to see his lifelong home or listen to us four girls whine more.

Still, Anna, Carol, Jennei and I had some good times there (specifically driving the ‘tractor’ and the ‘bomb’ car out on the farm …). As a child, I was more connected to my Granny’s house in Pleasanton, but it was sold after her death. In her later years, when I was in college, Mamaw moved to Houston. With both of them gone, and then my move to DC, I didn’t find much reason to go to Poteet, though I still talked about it often.

After I met Jason, I felt compelled, on our very first trip to Houston, to drag him to Poteet to see the farm with Dad and Nancy. As Nancy and I watched in the ‘shade’ of the unairconditioned house, Dad and Jason pulled armpit high weeds in the boiling hot Texas sun, and then we stayed in the old house overnight. Jason left without a really strong positive impression of Poteet.

I however, began to feel more and more nostalgic, and started pressuring my Dad and Nancy to build a new house, or fix up the old one, so we could have a connection in Texas. Inspired (or harangued), dad decided to build a house on the Poteet land next to the house he was raised in. He sold a house he owned in Houston; an architect from his church volunteered to draw up the plans; and the process was begun.

Papaw and Eleanor when we were living there this summer.

The longer I’ve been away from Texas (almost 20 years, now), the more I cling to memories of Poteet and Pleasanton growing up, and the more I want to offer my children some of those rural, running around crazy memories. Dad and Nancy, and their investment in building and maintaining this new farmhouse — not to mention helping us with our tickets to fly there every.single.time — have provided that opportunity.

Ever since Allyson was wee (less than 1) and Oliver was just slightly less wee, we’ve been going to Poteet. At first, it was just to look at the foundation and let the kids play in the piles of sawdust. Then it was to set up the house, buying dishes and beds and artwork. And then, in a very unexpected twist last year, it became a temporary home for our family as we decided where we would go after a short sojourn in New York City ended quite ignominiously.

Driving up with our trusty Honda and enormous moving van to our home-away-from-home in Poteet provided us with all the welcome that we needed. The kids — even baby Eleanor — start to unbuckle their seat belts as soon as we turn onto the land, and Oliver knows how to unlock the gate. We round the bend, and the new farmhouse and old farmhouse come into view, framed in glorious Texas light.

Oliver and Allyson, watering Dad’s beloved oak trees that he grew from ACORNS that he gathered down by the creek.

Dad and Nancy, and Mamaw and Papaw before them, were incredibly generous to create this home for us, this place, this land that we can walk as heroes, even when we feel quite downtrodden by life. That first breath of air, that first Shiner Bock on the front porch of the old house, that first glimpse of our boots waiting on the fireplace for us to return … this is our home, no matter how far we roam. And I am incredibly grateful to my Dad and Nancy for investing in it for us.

We aren’t living there now, but you will find us there for large chunks of time every year: breathing in the air, complaining about the ‘neighbors’ and checking out Poteet’s barbecue and breakfast tacos every six months or so. Thanks, Dad and Nancy, for the love and the safety we always find in Poteet.

Five months after Oliver was born, in August, my best friend Pam was expecting her second child. About a week before her due date, her husband came down with pneumonia. Pam called and asked if I would be her partner for the birth if it happened while Chris was sick — they don’t even let people with pneumonia near a birth ward, much less in it. I agreed, and I think we were both sure it wouldn’t be necessary.

Pam and I are dear friends, have been for decades, and we both value our privacy. We don’t end conversations with love (until recently), we avert our eyes when dressing together, and we don’t pry too much. So when the phone rang at 2 a.m. one night, just after we talked, I knew what it was about, and I was worried and excited. I was glad to be able to support Pam during her time in need, worried that she would miss Chris so much that I wouldn’t be much help, and also worried about being away from Oliver for so long (he was about 5 months old — still lots of nursing). I packed a lot of bottles and a pump and drove my visiting mother-in-law’s stick shift Miata to Baltimore. I met Pam in the emergency room, where she was tiredly waiting.

Pam with baby Samantha and me with baby Oliver a few weeks after Sam’s exciting birth.

I think both of our guards were down more than usual — it was the middle of the night, we were both way away from our comfort zones, and we were both worried about what would happen next. We started talking, checking in with how she was doing, and tracking her progress. The pain was intense but not regular, and they admitted her soon after and gave her a birthing room. Having just given birth months earlier, I was filled with advice but also aware of how little what you ‘think’ is going to happen is what actually happens. I tried to spend a lot of time listening.

Neither of us are big huggers, so I didn’t rub her back or hold her hand. We talked, a lot, and wondered what was happening with her son and husband at home. We wondered if her baby would be a boy or a girl, and if her parents would arrive before the birth (yes, just!). We breathed. We passed the time, together.

I was aware that the precious gift of Pam’s trust and time at this very private time came at the expense of her ill husband, and was grateful and yet wished he could be well. We called him often. As the hours passed, the pain became more intense, and the silences lingered. I was hoping she’d be okay, and she was, too, and we were both preoccupied with the baby to come.

I left to pump a couple of times; the hospital had a nursing room.

A few hours later, just after her beloved parents arrived from Kansas, Pam’s pain began in earnest. She had an epidural (I think?) but the pain was intense, and the pushing wasn’t helping. I could tell it was getting really close, and called Chris on the cell phone. Hearing his voice cheering her on made her cry, really cry, and push harder. He knew she could do it; we all did.

Watching Pam in pain, trying so hard and willing her body forward, was in some ways harder than when I had given birth. Seeing a dear friend in pain, and being unable to alleviate that pain, was a truly complicated experience. While I urged my husband not to say, “you’re right, it is harder to watch than to give birth,” I genuinely felt that a little bit during Pam’s labor.

Finally, after hours of labor, out came sweet baby Samantha, a girl. Pam’s relief was palpable, Chris was overjoyed, and they were both relieved: They had only chosen a name for a girl. Merrily and Lee (Pam’s parents) were overcome with joy.

I left soon after, gathering my many bottles of milk to return to my own (enormous by comparison) baby. But that day, in that room, being witness to one of the most private, powerful and transformational events in a person’s life — not just being witness, but assisting in, being needed in, was a huge gift to me. It showed me how much Pam trusted me, and taught me how much I could trust her in return. It made me prize her strength, and prize my own when I gave birth again. And, it made me finally allow someone other than Jason into my birthing rooms, and both Pam and Julie were witnesses when Eleanor was born, just over three years later.

Trust, whether that means trusting the world with endless thank you notes  or trusting your best friend with your time of need, is a life lesson I learn again and again, and often my lessons take place with my dear friend Pam. Thanks, Pam, for sharing the beauty of Sam’s birth with me.

So Eve Koopmann and I had a third twin (it’s complicated) in elementary school, Carol Hoffman. Actually, she was more our leader than our twin. Eve and I were both shockingly tall, remarkably early, and gangly. Carol was strong, athletic, and short. She was also a natural leader, with a willingness to organize and a strong, powerful voice.

Two memories that I’m thankful for: After Carol’s mom, Nancy, and my dad decided to get married, and we were yet blissfully unaware of the many complicated years that decision would create, we gleefully marched to our shared. We sat in a circle, as 1st and second graders did at Dodson Montessori school, and went around the room with news as we did every day. The time came for Carol to speak. She looked at me. We both burst out at the same time: We’re going to be SISTERS! For that glorious day, and perhaps a few others, we were the envy of the whole class. Friends, and now sisters: Who knew what could happen next!

A few years later. We’re well established now, and Carol and Eve’s neighborhood (oh I was so envious — not only did many of our school friends live there — right next to school! — but now my dad lived there, too!) was the nexus of after school ‘fun.’ I put fun in quotes because we are all right in the thrall of boy-girl love tension, as only 10 and 11 year olds can do, and we played that out by … fighting. We each had our boyfriends and wish-we-could-have boyfriends (Jon-Paul Estrada, Eliot, and I forget Carol’s man-of-the-hour), and we would meet on the corner of Harvest and Fiesta Streets after the school bus dropped us off.

It was a fight to the … I don’t know what, but it was a ferocious fight. And Carol was our leader. She would tell me and Eve (and the others gathered) what to do, and we would set out with clear instructions for our love/enemy. I usually wimped out before any blood got shed, but I remember one day with startling clarity — Eve being actually swung around by her long, glorious brown hair, and Carol jumping in with ferocity to stop the carnage and claim a win for the girls.

I’m not sure we won (I’m still amazed we survived relatively unharmed) but I remember envying and admiring Carol’s fearlessness and bravery in defending Eve.

Me, Eve and Carol with baby Maggie in Palestine, Texas.

The baby in this pic, Carol’s first, is now older than we were in those neighborhood fights, and I know Carol has fought for her, her three other children, and her life in Palestine, Texas as hard as she ever fought in elementary school. She leads me still. Thanks for your strength and your courage, sister.