Driving to my cousin's house one night, I had a very deep conversation with one of my sisters. We tend to always do that with each other every time we hangout and start chatting. I guess its a habit of ours. Anyways we were discussing certain things that were on our minds as to help lift all of the weight and heaviness we were feeling at the time. We both share the same worries about our family so we were both trying to uplift each other's spirits and help each other see that there were brighter days ahead of us. So then my mind starts to wonder off into its abyss of its infinite thoughts and it triggers a realization in me, along with the conversation I just had with my sister of course. So I begin to unfold to my sister the big picture that was blooming in my head. I said to her, " You know, its crazy how certain people are put in your life permanently like a tattoo." She nodded her head in agreement. I then continued my unfinished thought and started to elaborate more on what I was feeling and started telling her of the one person I thought of, who went through the same thing we were currently going through, to a significant extent. My best friend.
She had recently lost her mother due to her many health complications. In particular, she was a dialysis patient, which kind of threaded our circumstances together because my mother is a dialysis patient as well. Her mother and my mother started going to dialysis around the same time, so we always understood each other's daily lives, as far as our mother's constant struggles with being a dialysis patient. I can't really explain to anyone how hard it is for someone who is a dialysis patient, it's really something you have to see for yourself. But even then, you truly don't know how it feels to be in that position unless you have kidney failure. All I know is that I had my best friend there to share all of these struggles that I am currently facing everyday with my mom. What I mean by that are things like pushing my mother to always go and get dialyzed the three days she is supposed to go during the week. Its really imperative that she makes these dates, because if she doesn't she can cause her body to overwork itself and can cause significant damage to her functioning organs. And I swear I hate it when my mother skips her dialysis days because of how sick she gets. I go nuts when I hear my mom in the restroom all sick and see her sleeping all day because she is tired from being so sick. It really scares me too because I'm afraid of losing her to this, as my best friend lost her mother to the same thing.
Take for instance, around the time my best friend lost her mom, my mom was also in the hospital because she was so sick from not going to dialysis. for almost five days. Which is far too long for a dialysis patient to go without being dialyzed. I remember my mom being so sick, not being able to hold any food down in her stomach and coughing up thick flem. She had bronchitis which was triggered from not being dialyzed for as long as she had went without it. The scary thing about that was that she was taking, for what seemed like a long time, to get better. All I could think of was what my best friend had just gone through with her mom and it just shook me to my core. But there my best friend was explaining what my mom was going through and reassuring me that my mom was going to get better, when she had just lost her mother. Which amazed me, that she had so much strength within herself to be strong for me when she had just gone through such a tragedy of her own.
Ironically though, I had been there comforting her and being her rock through losing her mother because of the experience I had when I lost my dad. It seemed as if we had both understood each other on such a level and height of which we had never reached before. It was amazing to me how our actions were so ambiguous before, now all just became clear as day. She finally understood what I had went through when I lost my dad as well as why I did things or grieved the way that I did. In return, I understood how scared she always was when her mother got so sick from the health complications due to her dysfunctional kidneys. It was just all so surreal to me which brings me back to the beginning of the story.
I was telling my sister that I was amazed, that I would have never known that someone I met back in high school could be so significant to me. That someone could be so close to me throughout all of these years and go through a lot of the same things I have gone through, it was all just blowing my mind. I then set the bomb off on her, that was going off in my head, and asked her, "If I didn't go to the same high school as my best friend, who would have been there for me? Who would have been there for her? And most importantly who would we be? Where would we be?" We both kind of sat there in silence, soaking in every word and thought that I had just shared. I could just tell how affective my words were to her without her even saying anything at all. I then told her that I didn't want to think about who I would have been or even where I would be without my best friend. She then agreed with me and told me, " I don't know who or where I would be without you." which really hit my heart hard and brings me to her significance in my life.
I don't have the best relationship with both of my sisters, but even the sister I'm not as close to allows me to appreciate the close and unfathomable relationship I have with my other sister. So I know I beat this story to death, but when I lost my dad to cancer it brought me closer to one of my sisters and pushed me away from the other one, it seems. Before all of that madness occurred I had always been closer to my second oldest sister. I just figured it was because we were closer in age, but growing into an adolescent teenager, I was always rolling around with her. She was always there lifting me up when my cards were down. And I was always there for her being her "little big sister" as she likes to call me, because of all of the old wisdom I'm always putting in her life. Well, when we both lost our dad, we began to see who was really there for us and who wasn't. In came such a love that I couldn't even wrap my arms around to hug because of how humongous it was and is. I have always loved my sisters so dearly like no one's business, but when this tragedy struck our lives, it became a love that goes way past any words I could ever explain nor express.
We constantly are there for each other, always running to each other when something isn't right in our lives. On days that our hearts feel heavy from feeling the void in our hearts from losing our dad, there we are, there for each other. Sometimes its in person with a hug to take away the deep hurt we're feeling and other times it could be a text message wishing each other a great day. Which are the best to me because we still surprise each other and inadvertently make each other feel a thousand times better because the receiving end of the message was having a bad day and the sender had no clue they were having a bad day. I guess its a sister sensor we were born with, ha ha. Its just really insane to me how we can both come to each other with our own craziness, hear each other out and just be supportive and loving towards each other. I just know with such certainty that this relationship has made me, that this sister of mine has kept me swimming against the currents that life has me swimming against. We put tons and tons of hope in each others lives and when we need a reminder of why we're here or of how strong we can be, there we are. Just there for each other, being the rocks of each others lives. This all brings me back to what she said to me earlier, "I don't know who or where I would be without you?" I can honestly say the same thing about her. I don't know who or where I would be without her in my life.
Last but not least, there is one more person who has had such a significant place in my life, is another best friend of mine. I met her in high school as well. We were always really good friends back in those days but just became distant after high school. Well we began to start talking more when we were both in the same boats of situations. We had both just gotten out of really bad relationships. At the time I was in the beginning of just losing my dad and the relationship I was in caused more pain than it ever did help me. So there this best friend of mine was, helping me piece my heart together again. I did the same thing for her. We both were always there for each other, making each other laugh through the horrible pains we were feeling broken from. We got so close and always did things together, whether it was big or small, we were together. Going to the movies, out to eat, to concerts or even out of town. We did everything. She helped me see everything I was blind to and I did the same thing for her. We showed each other the way. We were always laughing at the most random things and of how anti-social and awkward we were. It was such a great reunited friendship to come out of such disastrous break-ups. This all occurred about two and a half years ago, when we both needed this friendship of ours to put ourselves back together again. But just recently I had a little fall out with this friend.
I won't go into too many details, but to say the least, I kind of blew up on her over something that I should of spoken my mind about instead of keeping it in and letting it become such an explosion. Well we had stopped talking for about a month and it totally killed me. I had put my own foot in my mouth and because a lack of clear communication on both ends, there we were, not speaking. So when I absolutely couldn't take it anymore, I texted her a song from a band that we both loved. We had gone to a ten year anniversary concert of theirs together in the summer of 2013. Well that's where I kind of broke the wall of ice I had put up in between us and we began talking again. Of course we both apologized for the way things happened and said that we would be better at communicating the next time around. But I couldn't help but think of how everything felt so upside down in my life, without having her there for me the way she always has been. I know it was just a month but it felt like forever to me and not being able to just come to her with whatever was on my heart killed me. I seriously felt the big hole in my heart, that she filled with her love, when we weren't speaking. I don't think either of us realized just how significant we were to each other, had it not been for this fall out. Everything is back to normal now, and our friendship is even better now if you ask me. I guess all friendships go through rough patches to see if you will both make it in the end. So here I come again, to this question. Where and who would I be without her? And who and where would she be without me??
All three of these people represent different parts of my life, all significant and special in their own way. I can't help but think that these three people have a big part of my identity. As different as these relationships are, they have been threaded together to make me, me. So again, who and where would I be without these three??
