Yesterday was an amazing day for me and I just wanted to share it with you.

My oldest and dearest friend in the world, Tracey, and I spent the day together yesterday.  It was a beautiful spring day in Brenham.  On the drive out there, the clouds were heavy and dark in sky, and it worried me.  But as I left the gloom of Houston behind and got out to Hempstead, the sun was shining and the journey was one of  excitement.

Tracey and I met the first day of First Grade.  And while we may have only gone to school together for 3 years, we have always been friends.  I’d like to thank both of our amazing Mom’s for that.  Those two women drove Tracey and I to each others house each weekend.  I mean, it was a given that we were staying the night at each other’s house each and every weekend since we didn’t get to see each other during the week, right?  Then Tracey moved to Campwood.  I had no idea where Campwood was.  Honestly, I couldn’t tell you exactly, but I know what it’s close to, so I’m better off than some.  Hey, give me a break, Texas is freaking huge! Well, we saw each other less.  Then we grew up and graduated high school and started the rest of our lives.  And we saw each other less and less.  But we always kept in touch.  Either letters in the mail or phone calls.  Then there were the weddings, ours, our friends…then kids, mine, hers… the jobs, the careers, the spouses and now, 41 years later, we live 90 minutes from each other and we are both “retired”.  So what are you going to do?  That’s it, spend some time with the one person other than your hubby that knows you so well.

I wake up early so I can get out to Brenham by 10.  I make my big cuppa and get it ready in the “to go” insulated yeti knock-off (that works better), pack a purse (shocked?  I was) and head out the door.

Tracey has really good taste in decorating and nifty antiques.  She gets it from her Mom who put Martha Stewart to shame.  That lady from Magnolia (the shop in Waco, they have a show on one of the cable channels), she could learn a few things from Tracey’s Mom.  Seriously.   There is this big antique show/fair/whatever it’s called going on now from Round Top, Texas to somewhere that’s an hour and a half away.   I wouldn’t know an antique if it bit me on the bottom, so I was excited to get schooled on something new.

However, we had to stop and eat before we headed out.  Duh.  Since I have given up “fast food” for Lent this year, I have been dying for a cheese burger.  We went to this gas station restaurant in Burton.  I wish I could remember the name, but it escapes me right now.  I’ll try to get that for you.  It was the best freaking cheese burger that I think I have ever had.

After the marathon lunch (we talked a lot, we laughed, I cried), we were off to find all those hidden goodies that no one but us wanted.  Wow!  I SO got educated yesterday.  At least from the context of this..this…whatever this is.  We traipsed around peoples yards and businesses looking at old dusty things, old not so dusty things and honestly, a lot of just crap.  Some of it looked like people were just having a garage sale, calling the stuff old and trying to sell it for 2x what they paid for it 20 years ago.  I may not know much (at all) about antiques, but I know they need to be older than from the 1980’s.  I think that’s in the “classic” category and not the “antique” one.  But that could just be me.

Oh no, don’t get me wrong, I still found some stuff to buy.  What?  Well, you’re going to think that it’s silly, but I bought 2 tea sets.  I don’t know the history of them at this point, but thankfully I know how to use Google and I will find out. Will I ever use them?  Probably not.  They will go in the knick-knack cabinet and never be seen again…

We headed back to her house to check and make sure the crockpot hadn’t burned the house down, you know things like that and I  saw a horse out in the pasture with her foal.  That’s what the photo attached to this post is.  Please, allow me to paint this picture for you.  The sun is shining, the breeze is blowing gently. There are flowers in bloom all around you and it’s quiet.  No traffic noise, no teenage boys yelling at each other, the phone isn’t blowing up on you…  It’s a perfect moment.  All is right in your world.   Everything is balanced just as it should be and you are supposed to be there, in that place at that moment and see this magnificent thing in front of you.  I don’t really know how else to explain it.  It was just perfect.

Yes, I know this is getting hard to read.  Yes, it’s long.  It will be worth it.  I promise.

We head into Brenham at this point to go visit Tracey’s mom.  She’s been ill and is living in an assisted living facility.  I know that was a difficult decision to make and while it sucks,  I am glad that Tracey (and her siblings) were able to make the decision to get their mom help now before he health made it to where they were unable to care for her or damaged their relationship with her so badly that they didn’t want to.  It’s really hard to be a parent to kids that won’t listen (when growing up), but I can’t imagine being a daughter telling her Mom what to do.  It’s a real and serious conversation that you should have with your parents and loved ones so that if the necessity arises, you know how to deal with it and move forward.

We’re at the home, having a great visit (I have always loved Tracey’s parents when they weren’t scaring the tar out of me growing up.  They were absolutely my second Mom and Dad) with Tracey’s Mom, reminiscing and learning new things and giggling at silly things that were were saying and suddenly the fire alarm goes off.   I have NEVER seen Tracey move that fast, ever, in my life.  We gathered Mom up and skedaddled out of there as fast as we could.   I can’t tell you the number of rock concerts I have been to where I have been in front of the speakers. You know where you are and you can feel your teeth vibrating with the music.  Actually where you can feel all of your body parts vibrating with the music.  Well, that feeling had NOTHING on how loud this fire alarm was.  My ears where ringing from it for about 4 hours last night.  I had to drive home with the music turned almost all the way up to hear it properly last night.  It was SO loud.  I figured it was for the residents who have hearing issues.  One of the employees told us that there are many residents who don’t hear the alarms when they go off… That blew me away!  Sorry, I digress…   So we are out in the parking lot forever. I think it was like 2 hours, but looking back on it the next day, it was possibly only an hour.  Heck it might have been 30 minutes, but it sure felt much longer.

The best part of hanging out in the parking lot?  Seeing these wonderful Firemen.  I jokingly told some of the ladies that they needed to pull the fire alarms more often to get the Firemen out there more to look at.  I know I laughed from it.  I’m going to blame the lack of response from  the ladies because their hearing hadn’t come back yet.

We finished up our visit after things had started to return to business as usual.  It was getting quite late and I wanted to see my boys before they went to bed.  I said my byes to Tracey’s mom and then to Tracey in the parking lot and made may way onto the freeway and headed home.  Normally, the drive home feels like I’ve left something or forgotten something.  Not this time.  I left feeling whole, feeling complete and fulfilled.  I know that sounds strange, but it was the most amazing day.

I got to go to new places, meet new people, do something I’ve never done before, stop and enjoy a perfect moment while looking at a miracle of nature and motherhood, enjoy the bluebonnets, eat an amazing cheeseburger and spend time with someone who is so very important to me.  And I got to see her Mom too!   Looking back, the whole day was a perfect moment.

See what can happen when you start the day with a good cuppa?