Leavin on a Jet Plane

P and I leave tomorrow for Sunny Southern California. Oh, how I long for some sun. It has been cloudy and rainy here for about 7 days straight, which really dampens my spirit. I need some sunshine!

We are on our way to So Cal for a wedding on the beach. One of my old roomies is getting hitched. And we are traveling to the wedding with one of my other old roomies. Before I got married I lived in this great house with 5 other women- but the 5 other women kept changing so all in all I had about 13 different housemates in this one house. This will be a little reunion of sorts- there will be at least 4 of us there.

It feels important to go to this wedding and witness this union for a friend that I lived with for a season. When we lived together she wasn't dating and she was fresh in the professional world trying to figure out what she wanted to do and who she wanted to be when she grows up. Now she lives in So Cal, near her family, has a job she is excited about, has built up a community around her, and she is getting married. She is stepping into a new season of life, making a commitment to the man that she loves. And I am honored to witness this step.

Of course this isn't the end of her story, it isn't as if she is all grown up now. But she is saying good-bye to her 'single' life which is the season that I knew her in, and she is moving into a role as wife (and mother it turns out- to two darling step children). So, it feels good and right to join her in celebrating the newness that will come from this ceremony. And I am happy to bring P with me, to share these friendships with her and to instill in her an appreciation for friends and seasons and celebrations.