richelle-e-goodrich

Friendship true is a vow of care.A warm embrace when in despair.A loving presence waiting thereto lift a heart, its burdens bear.Friendship true is an earnest prayer.A tongue of praise for one__ welfare.A smile __id laughs as light as air,and thoughtfulness most kind and rare.

If I could have one friend,just one in all the world,I know that I would not seek outa boy or pretty girl.The friend I__ dare to chooseto stand by me each daywould be a dragon fierce enoughto scare the world away.

What is so rewarding about friendship?_ my son asked, curling his upper lip into a sour expression. __aking friends takes too much time and effort, and for what?_ I sat on the edge of his bed, understanding how it might seem simpler to go at life solo. __riendship has unique rewards,_ I told him. __hey can be unpredictable. For instance...._ I couldn__ help but pause to smile crookedly at an old memory that was dear to my heart. Then I shared with my son an unforgettable incident from my younger years. __rue story. When I was about your age, I decided to try out for a school play. Tryouts were to begin after the last class of the day, but first I had to run home to grab a couple props for the monologue I planned to perform during tryouts. Silly me, I had left them at the house that morning. Luckily, I only lived across a long expanse of grassy field that separated the school from the nearest neighborhood. Unluckily, it was raining and I didn__ have an umbrella. __etermined to get what I needed, I raced home, grabbed my props, and tore back across the field while my friend waited under the dry protection of the school__ wooden eaves. She watched me run in the rain, gesturing for me to go faster while calling out to hurry up or we would be late. __he rain was pouring by that time which was added reason for me to move fast. I didn__ want to look like a wet rat on stage in front of dozens of fellow students. Don__ ask me why I didn__ grab an umbrella from home__eenage pride or lack of focus, I__ not sure__ut the increasing rain combined with the hollering from my friend as well as my anxious nerves about trying out for the play had me running far too fast in shoes that lacked any tread. __bout a yard from the sidewalk where the grass was worn from foot traffic and consequently muddied from the downpour of rain, I slipped and fell on my hind end. Me, my props, and my dignity slid through the mud and lay there, coated. My things were dripping with mud. I was covered in it. I felt my heart plunge, and I wanted to cry. I probably would have if it hadn__ been for the wonderful thing that happened right then. My crazy friend ran over and plopped herself down in the mud beside me. She wiggled in it, making herself as much a mess as I was. Then she took my slimy hand in hers and pulled us both to our feet. We tried out for the play looking like a couple of swine escaped from a pigsty, laughing the whole time. I never did cry, thanks to my friend. __o yes, my dear son, friendship has its unique rewards__riceless ones.

On a grim and dismal day that shattered my last ounce of confidence, I broke down and whimpered, ____ awful and hideous and incompetent and boring and utterly useless._ And then you grinned at me and said, __hat__ okay.

Laugh, and the world longs to be your friend.

I love you for a great many reasons and despite a great many others.

Please stop. If you keep chipping off little pieces of my heart, soon there will be no heart left with which to love you.

There is love and then there is fluff. Nothing else.

Your face is engraved in my mind. I can__ erase it. I don__ want to. Because as much as I hate you, I love you. And I love you unforgettably.

When I first heard your voice, my heart leapt in my chest as if it recognized you as its owner from another lifetime.

I hope you know I love you, not just because I tell you so at every opportunity, but because I show you so as often as the sun sets.

Truth is, I__ generally happiest when it__ just me. It__ okay to be madly in love with yourself.

At the core of love is validation. It is what gives love power. For when love is given away, validation seeps in and expands in the heart of the recipient, filling up every empty, dark corner. It is a wonderful, light, consuming feeling we long for, and once found, we hope__ven expect__t will forever remain. But there are times when that most precious love is revoked, and a hard scab forms over the empty hole. Though this scab is both healing and protective, it is the reason why validation from future love may not seep in so easily, no matter how wanting the heart.

Maybe love isn__ meant to be bliss never-ending. Maybe love is unwavering support and befriending.

Amore is loveconfessed to you in haiku.Do you love me too?

She laughed, and he fell in love.

Love by the sweat of thy brow.Not through whispered words of hollow sound or lofty dreams ne__r substance bound that more than oft do run aground. Nay, love with mighty, blistered hands that turn the soil and carve the land. A bearer of toil and golden band. Be strong! A founder of the feast! Protective knight who slays the beast! For promises and vows aloud are naught but wispy veneer shroud like cobwebs, frail, the airy words and wooing fail. So work, my darling. Toil as proof. Thy loyal heart be drained of youth and yet beat on, incessant sound. Both feet take root within the ground, and service be thy kingly crown.Love by the sweat of thy brow.

I never realized how much you meant to me until someone spoke your name and an irrepressible, goofy grin stretched my lips.