Old Friend

I saw one of my best friends from high school today. She lives in Maryland, and I haven't seen her for TEN years. (Geography has not been kind to us!)

Shanna is one of my oldest friends. We became friends when her family moved to New York - well over twenty-five years now. She holds my high school secrets, and her parents were like my own.

Shanna and I both worked at Wegmans and were both exchange students (I went to Norway, she went to Sweden.) She was there for my first, and second, loves - and I returned the favor. We took art classes together in high school, and skipped those same art class together. We were bunk mates at Youth Conference and on Temple Trips.

Shanna was a year behind me in school, but the day I graduated from High School - she was there to cheer me on:

I was Shanna's bride's maid in April 1994:

Less than two weeks later, at the same temple, we switched places. (OK, I realize now that, despite the popularity of floral dresses in the 1990s, I should have opted for a solid color, like Shanna did.)

She visited me while I was at BYU. Even after we were both married I was able to visit her a couple times in Maryland. This picture was taken in August 1997, Shanna was pregnant with her second child. She now has three girls, I have three boys.

So today we sat in a park at talked. We chatted about our parents and siblings, our kids, our communities, our travels. We talked about what was hard, what was funny and what worried us for the future. We didn't talk too much about old times, but why would we? We just picked up right where we were. What an amazing gift. Love that girl!