Giving Thanks

Since I plan to take the rest of the week off blogging so that I can focus on family time over the holiday, I figured I would put my normal "Wedding Wednesday" on hold and spend a moment giving thanks instead.

And while I could rattle off the "standard" list of things I'm thankful for, which really hasn't changed since last year or the year before (except, of course, that I'm thankful this year for the baby growing in my belly), I'm going to focus instead on a specific thing that I'm thankful for--namely, a specific group of people that I'm thankful for, and especially thankful for the fact that I got to spend some quality time with them last night.

I have known these girls (separately and together) for the better part of my life. KWills, on the far left, lived just down the street from the house my family moved into when I was five. She and her mom brought us cookies to welcome us to the neighborhood, and we've been friends ever since. Eddy, to my left, and I have gone to church together since, well, about as long as I can remember. I met Jen (to my right) in seventh grade through the other two. Seventh grade was also the year I joined these three on a club soccer team, and we spent many fun years playing together and traveling to tournaments together. In fact, for most of our years on the team, these girls and I were the defense of the team--I was the keeper, Jen was my sweeper/center back, and Eddy and KWills were my outside backs. So many good times.

Countless years later, we still get together whenever we have the opportunity, and it's like we've never missed a beat. While I could go on about why I love spending time with these girls, the best way I can think of to sum up why I these girls are so important to me is to say that last night while we were hanging out, we (unintentionally) had discussions on all three of the "taboo" conversation topics: sex, religion, and politics. And I don't mean that as a bragging point that we all share the same views and perspectives on those topics and subsequently have no problem discussing those issues; in fact, quite the opposite is true. But these are all girls who will never judge you for having an opinion different from theirs, and are always open to engage in conversation with people of different opinions to widen their own knowledge, not to push their opinion on others. There's no right or wrong, just open-mindedness and acceptance of who you are. And for that, I am thankful.