No quote today---the quotes that usually come out
when Lauren and I are together are our own and either no one will
get them because they weren't there are they are NOT appropriate! (SMILE)

Today is a happy day for me. Right now I am sitting at Barnes & Nobles in Zona Rosa in KC, MO. I have just come from lunch at Tom Fooleries with a good friend, Lauren. She and I met randomly the fall of my junior year at BC...she was a senior. She now goes to grad school at St. John's in Minnesota. She is pursuing her Masters in Theology---I know, I know...you're all asking how JEN can be friends with a theology student---sometimes I wonder myself...but she handles me quite well! :) Since she moved to MN I do not get to spend a lot of time with her, so the time we do have is quite treasured. We never cease to laugh (usually at the other)...we talk about life...we solve the problems of the world and can't quite understand why the world doesn't ask US before it does things, we have so many good answers! (SMILE) We are those friends who can sit in silence and be okay with it, who can be serious and be okay, and who can be goofy and be just as okay. She is one of my best friends and her moving to MN has taught me that friendship and love is not a matter of location, but of heart. I had to learn that geographic distance doesn't have to mean distance of the heart...a good lesson for which I am grateful.

We spent some time at Tom Fooleries, then went for a walk around Zona Rosa, savoring the heat after a cold restaurant (yes, we're both whimps to the cold). Though it was only a couple of hours, I am grateful for the time together and for the presence she holds in my life! :) We are Murph & Mac, as S. Mary Benet so sweetly calls us! I am so grateful right now, for the awesome friends in my life, the gift of their presence, and the lessons I have learned from so many of them. Barnes & Nobles is a great place to sit and be grateful...I spent about an hour reading the poetry of Mary Oliver who speaks ever so simply to my heart.

Picture: Lauren and Me when we were celebrating Catharines birthday at this salsa club in Westport last summer....I think we were hysterically laughing and having TOO much fun! :)