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The Beauty of Long Term Friendships
86 Plays13 days ago
The gift of a lifelong friendship is a rare and precious gift. This week, host Tracy Johnson and special guest Becky Allender reflect on two of their longest friendships together. With a poignant conversation that touches themes of loyalty, memory, laughter, and also grief, Tracy and Becky practice gratitude for the women who have enriched their lives over decades. Join us for a sacred conversation on the power of friendship.
For more stories from brave, ordinary women, join us at Red Tent Living.
Transcript
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi, I am Tracy Johnson, and this is the Red Tent Living Podcast, where brave women host honest conversations about our beautiful and hard ordinary. Each week we share stories with the hope of seeing one another a little better and affirming each other across different seasons and perspectives. We're excited for you to join us. Welcome to our table.
00:00:26
Speaker
Becky, it's so good to see you. Oh, Tracy, it's wonderful to see you. Long time, no see. Long time, no see. And I have to say, like I am loving that as you and I are recording this, it is also like the last week of the writing space on Red Tent Living. And it feels so sweet to me that you and I get to talk because you were with us from the very beginning, and then you're here with me today. So I i love that.
00:00:56
Speaker
It's full school, right? It is. And kind of we're stepping in more fully to this podcasting space and just feel so sweet to still have you with us. Yes, I'm really thrilled and honored. yeah Um, so you and I are going to talk about lasting friendship, um, on our episode today. And I've said this to you before, one of the things that I have loved, um, learning about you and watching unfold both in our friendship and then in the, in the spaces where you've written for red tent living is
00:01:34
Speaker
You have some really long-standing friendships all the way back to grade school. I do. so It's so wonderful, yes. Yeah, i don't I do not have that. So I have just really loved getting to see that and what that's looked like for you. And I imagine maybe we'll touch on that a little bit more. um And then you and I have also shared between the two of us, some of the places where it's felt hard to keep longstanding friendship. Yes, and it's been a little rocky, but here we are. Yes, here we are. ah How would you feel about going first and sharing your story today? Oh, I'd love to go first. Tracy, thank you.
00:02:25
Speaker
Okay. We never know when the last will come. How do we know this is our last visit to a dear family member's home? When a friend turns against us, how can we know the week before was the last we would eat lunch together? We know all things end. We know death will take us and those we love. However, often we have no clue when our last goodbye will occur.
00:02:55
Speaker
Julie was my first friend. Our parents and our grandparents were friends. Our mothers were pregnant at the same time. Julie is five months older than me and I have always adored her. We grew up going to the same church and we went to each other's birthday parties. No one was surprised that we always sat next to each other whenever we were in the same room.
00:03:26
Speaker
I could never replicate her mischievous antics and wholehearted laughter. Julie was the queen of laughter. We were like Ethel Mertz and Lucille Ball. Who wants to be Ethel? No one. All of us want to be Lucy. And that's who my Julie has always been in my eyes and in my heart.
00:03:51
Speaker
Because of Julie, I gravitate to people who not only make me laugh, but who like to walk on the wild side. That sometimes means a dangerous path. Probably it's because of her that I married a man who is sometimes dangerous and who always knows how to make me laugh. I loved Julie from the beginning of my days. Certainly, she was the first friend who attuned to me and me to her.
00:04:21
Speaker
I don't remember not loving her. She was as real as the sun and as green as grass in the spring. I am not sure how living will be without her on this side of heaven. no On this past Mother's Day weekend, Julie called to tell me that she has glioblastoma. A few weeks later, she found out that the tumor was on both sides of her brain and too big for surgery.
00:04:51
Speaker
We faithfully took her chemo and radiation treatments for the first three weeks. We held on to hope that was bigger than possible. Dan bought our flights to Columbus, knowing this journey was too big for me to do alone. Then days before we flew, Julie called to tell me that she was back in the hospital because she was too weak to stand. Cancer was now in her spine.
00:05:20
Speaker
Two days before we arrived, Julie got three blood clots in her legs. She was transferred to rehab from the hospital. The three days of our visit were agonizing. After the second visit on the second day,
00:05:39
Speaker
I knew we had one more day together, another few precious hours to be in her presence. On our last day and final visit, I felt like there was no air in the room or in my lungs. The time passed, but I could find no space to imagine life on this earth without her. It was time. The moment came as it will for all of us. Dan and I went to Julie's bedside and held hands while Dan prayed. I could barely breathe, let alone talk.
00:06:09
Speaker
The words finally came through my throat. I will see you again, my friend. and she like yes On this day or on the other side, on this earth or on the other side, we walked, Dan and I walked down a hallway with profoundly broken people in every room.
00:06:28
Speaker
There were sounds of voices, machines, and the whir of wheelchairs. How could it all end with so few words? How could a lifetime of laughter, secrets, and banter end with 15 words? I held all that I felt in a compartment of my heart. Until we exited the building, and once outside, I wrapped my arms around Dan and began to weep. I wanted to wail like a wolf.
00:06:58
Speaker
Then I heard my name. Walking into the hospital was Julie's son Michael and two gorgeous daughters who both had the same mannerisms, hair, and facial configuration of Julie.
00:07:16
Speaker
My tears were wiped away and I knelt to introduce myself to the girls. One had just returned from Camp Wyndott, the camp that Julie and I went to all every summer. Life, Gloria's beautiful captivating life, stood in front of me and greeted me with a flourish that cried out, death will not get the final word. My tears will always be filled with incapable grief and yet equally fueled by the provision of the resurrection. That promises I will see Julie, my first and forever beautiful friend again. I don't even know how to speak. Yesterday at this very time, which is 9 27, I got a call from Julie's older brother.
00:08:15
Speaker
Of course I know dearly. And Tom said, this is the call. Becky. So I wrote this while she was living and now I read and she's no longer here. I am. I felt the cadence of your voice shift.
00:08:39
Speaker
as you as you walked in to actually see her. I didn't recognize her. Her name was there, Julia f Flay, but I walked in and said, I'm looking for Julie. I didn't recognize her. Each day I didn't recognize her. I could um i could feel my own breath.
00:09:02
Speaker
tighten and feel like it was it was um constricted. Just the idea of being in the presence of somebody you've known your whole life. Yes. A friend, the very first friend you could ever remember. The very first. Yes. Becky.
00:09:23
Speaker
i mean to walk, to walk your friend home. And my dad walked her dad home, my parents walked her dad home, and then back and forth. And yes, it's been generations. What do you notice happening in you right now, just in your body? Well, I mean, the tears feel right. At times, I can say my friend died and not feel the tears, but
00:09:54
Speaker
the extravagance in the in the, how wild is this to have this podcast at this time? It feels good to have been able to speak of my friendship with Julie. It feels, yeah, it feels sort of stunning to me and um and divine.
00:10:20
Speaker
yeah yeah and the in the appointment of time because you and I planned this weeks ago. yes um the I felt the bigness Becky as you were naming like the both and the both and of of that walk down the hallway and leaving with your husband And then as you're wanting to wail just moments later, like turning to basically see your friend's face in her granddaughter's faces. Yes. And that they just come back from the same camp that you and Julie went to. It's just it it's it's too big to hold. it just like i You can feel me. I don't have words.
00:11:10
Speaker
I know it was like Michael was just full of life and I haven't seen him for a while. And there were these beautiful two granddaughters that were like, oh, it was like God said, I'm giving this to you because otherwise I thought I would be flattened on that sidewalk. I did not know how I could take a step. And to hear my voice, like that must be a different Becky. I'm not in Seattle. Right. Yeah. Right.
00:11:40
Speaker
and And again, we can feel the lavishness of the timing, the divine appointment. Yes. Yeah, we got there just in time. with this We were in the time before her doctor said no more treatments, hospice. We were in that hoping time. and And yet I think the other thing that I love, it takes so much courage to it takes so much courage to step into an ending.
00:12:11
Speaker
with intention and with kindness and with words. and And you did that. You did that for you and you did it for Julie. You put words to the reality. You didn't leave it hanging. And you could have. i Yes, I could have. She knows I'm far away. And even one visit, she never opened her eyes. But I had to speak.
00:12:38
Speaker
remind her of her goodness throughout her life to me. And i and it and it feels like such a kindness to yourself too. i You know are right. I don't even think I've pondered that, Tracy. It was the right thing to do, but I hadn't thought the kindness to myself. Yeah.
00:13:04
Speaker
yeah
00:13:08
Speaker
thank you for Thank you for writing it and thank you for still choosing to share it today, not holding it back or keeping it just for you. It was a privilege. Thank you. Thank you that we didn't even know how good this moment would be together. nothing I feel so privileged to get to be here and bear witness to you today, 24 hours after you know that Julie's left the earth.
00:13:38
Speaker
Yes, thank you. And it feels like like you're the right person in a lot of ways because you were there for me in ways I couldn't have a man imagined and that was open hearts, the journey, right? You walked in my story when it was ah just right for you to be there because you had the strong words and the strong arms. l Thank you, Gaki.
00:14:07
Speaker
I just I think right in this moment I just feel so stunned to by um just how good God actually is and often it feels like he's in the background and we don't know you know and we can't imagine and And we can't plan and yet and yet in a moment like this where it feels like it's full circle in so many ways and you can palpably feel where he he was there and he is there, he's doing something.
00:14:38
Speaker
yeah um And the kind the death and resurrection like flowing almost simultaneously both in that story in the day you were there and yesterday unto today.
00:14:54
Speaker
Yes. Yes. She knows Jesus. Well, she's with him right now. I trust. o ah Well, thank you again.
00:15:06
Speaker
um Well, how about ah how about I'll share my story. It's a little so it's a little different. um Like I said, as we were coming on, i we moved so often when I was a kid. And and so long standing friendship for me, I can i can trace back to you know about 10 years old.
00:15:26
Speaker
um and still have a you know a couple of friends that have been in my life from the time I was 10, 11, 12. But ah today, as I was thinking about what I wanted to share, I kind of went looking back through some stories and and some spaces around friendship. And I came on this letter that I wrote to my my very dear friend Shelly on her 40th birthday. Oh wow. and And she and I are just, we we are just about to turn 60. And so I thought, you know, this is, I think I'm gonna, I think this is what I'm gonna share. um So I'm gonna, I'm gonna read a letter that I wrote to my friend on her 40th birthday. We've been friends um about six years when I wrote this letter. Nice.
00:16:15
Speaker
Dear Shelly, as I've pondered what to share with you today, I found myself reminiscing a bit. Although you have shared that you recall our initial meeting being when I was staying with our friend Sue, I remember the point of impact being a bit later. Early in December of 2000, before we exchanged much more than a hello, I was unloading my wet laundry into your dryer prior to going out to celebrate our friend Sue's birthday.
00:16:44
Speaker
ah Thus began a precedent of you giving beyond the norm to me. I remember that night we sat at a table at Reggiano's. I have no memory of what other conversation took place, but I vividly recall you leaning in towards me from across the table as we talked, as if to say, I want to know you, really know you.
00:17:07
Speaker
That night we ate tiramisu, which is best when eating at Reggiano's. I looked up tiramisu in Italian to see what it means. And it means to pick or to draw. And that seems so perfect to describe how you've made me feel. You've picked me and drawn me into your heart.
00:17:26
Speaker
will It had been a very long time since I had had a friend my age, my height, my weight, my capacity for life in general. Okay, well actually I had never had a friend who met all those criteria. You felt too good to be true, but you were true. You've become my best shopping buddy.
00:17:46
Speaker
We've shared the joy of the hunt, the thrill of victory, and just when the right item is found for a screaming low price. You have laughed with me. We have been ridiculously silly despite the presence of middle-aged men seated across the aisle from us on airplanes. You've been my salon companion introducing me to the fact that it really was okay for me to have a pedicure.
00:18:09
Speaker
You've generously and extravagantly given to me and my family, providing the perfect gift on so many times beyond what could have been hoped for. You've cared for my children emotionally, physically, and spiritually.
00:18:24
Speaker
You've been Katie's inspiration and you're the woman she desires to model her life after. wow You have been for her in some ways what I am not and I love that. You've wept with me during the most painful times and you've known when to speak and when to sit silently, just letting me know that you're there.
00:18:43
Speaker
You've been Jesus' hands and feet for sure. And on August 4th, the day Libby was born, you were the voice saying, she's pink and she's fat. Your presence in those hours was the embodiment of his care for me and for Libby. In my heart, when I cried, oh God help from my mouth, I cried, call Shelly now. As always, you were there when I desperately needed you bringing exactly what my heart needed, hope.
00:19:12
Speaker
It is interesting to me that as I have spent time in God's word, there really are not obvious examples of friendships between women. Naomi was Ruth's mother-in-law, so for me that doesn't totally count. I have wondered why that is.
00:19:28
Speaker
My conclusion is that so often women struggle in their friendships. There's comparison, competition, envy, jealousy, gossip. Those things tear at the fabric of who God designed us to be and they interfere with the lasting deep soul friendship. Those things have never been part of our friendship.
00:19:49
Speaker
I found that as I ponder our relationship, it is most like David and Jonathan. In 1 Samuel 18.1 it says, the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as his own.
00:20:04
Speaker
I've read that David and Jonathan shared a covenant relationship characterized by deep concern and affection. The covenant was a mutual agreement in which David and Jonathan were bound to care for the needs and attend to the interests of each other. It was a treaty between equals. The nature of their love was unselfish, and you've shown me that kind of love and that kind of friendship. The impact is deep and lasting.
00:20:32
Speaker
The bottom line is that you have shown me extravagant love, Shelly. This quote is perfect to describe how have you been how who you have been to me. Sharon Hirsch says, extravagant love is really a matter of the heart. It is an accumulation of moments marked by persistence, vulnerability, and discipline. It is found in the rare and daily expressions of love, the speaking of truth, and the forgiveness of wrongdoing.
00:21:02
Speaker
So my dear friend, on your 40th birthday, know this. You have had a tremendous impact. You have loved extravagantly. You have touched lives for the glory of God. You've been Jesus' hands and feet to many. You are dearly loved and you are my most precious friend.
00:21:19
Speaker
but A lot of territory she is to you. It is a lot. Wow. So much depth, so much ah constant care and love. And I think what stood out the most is when you were giving birth to Libby, you said call Libby, right? I mean, call Shelly. Like I'm curious what actually was happening, you know, because I had a difficult birth.
00:21:51
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, i at the point that I was saying that, I mean, everything was everything was going wrong. Everything that could go wrong was going wrong. And and along with being my best friend, Shelly is also a pediatrician. So wow she's the kid's pediatrician. And and so i I knew I needed both. I needed my friend. And ah and I needed my kid's doctor.
00:22:17
Speaker
um so that story ah like i i the last thing i had heard was that libby libby was blue and in the corner and they were working on her trying to get her to breathe and mark had told me that and so I didn't know if Libby was alive. I didn't know. um And Shelly came through the doors, obviously as a doctor, they let her in. She came through the doors and by the time she did, she could see Libby in the corner and she was starting to pink up. um yes And so her words were the first words that told me that Libby was alive.
00:22:55
Speaker
Oh my gosh, that's just cemented in life for you. It is. It is. It is. It's one of those moments that it's like you'll never forget. You'll never forget.
00:23:15
Speaker
Yeah, as i read it as I read it thinking about sharing it today, I'm like, wow, 20 years later, I would say all of those same things and and more. i you know I could certainly say more. And at that point, we lived in the same city. and um and And in 2010, we moved out of San Antonio, and yet ah you know the friendship stood. It took even more intentionality, yeah as you know, because you you didn't stay in Columbus forever. And so but you know when you when distance begins to separate you, but you know you have you have to make different choices to keep the friendship intact.
00:24:07
Speaker
and you have done that so stunningly from 40th to now 60th. I love how you said that your souls were knit together and then you had such beautiful scriptures that enriched that so profoundly. It's just so good because not much did I have to think of me and Julie, but of course Kind of the bedrock, but no jealousy, and but no friend. Oh, Tracy, you have more ahead. You have so many more years. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We do. We do.
00:24:53
Speaker
and i am I loved when you said that one of your daughters, maybe Katie, you said, models her life after. How grand is that? So intergenerational. It was. At the time that I wrote this, Katie katie was still and ah in a place in her life where her plan was to was to go into medicine. and And so, yeah, I mean, and that feels like one of those places too, where i I could choose to be so grateful for my friend that my daughter connected with in ways that she didn't connect with me.
00:25:36
Speaker
you know i I do not have a brilliant scientific mind. I could not have been a physician. I could have been my path. I'm terrible at math and I'm not great at science. um but or i could have Or I could have felt jealous.
00:25:53
Speaker
you know and and envious. and And I can remember, Becky, like choosing gratitude, you know, choosing gratitude for for this for my dear friend's presence in my daughter's life um ah in in ways that Katie needed. it Yes. Oh, yes. And I'm breathing with that gratitude in my body. It's like I'm breathing for the goodness that is still in the land of the living. I'm breathing that there's there's more to come. There's more to come with Shelly with you.
00:26:36
Speaker
yeah yeah wish sha i lost buddies yeah the prize but yeah where we we love a good We love a good bargain. We were just shopping two weeks ago in Phoenix, so it's something we love for sure.
00:26:52
Speaker
As you think, Becky, as you think about like what's sustained friendship, because I think that's part, I know like anytime we do anything on red tent living around friendship, women flock. and It's like they sit and listen almost with bated breath because the, the,
00:27:12
Speaker
struggle to have lasting friendships with women, I think is real. And so I wonder for you, you know, as you think about what we've shared today, like, what, what would you tell our listeners are, are, are things that you know to be true for you and what, what watered like lasting friendship for, for you and, and Julie? Well, I think First, I want to say, like take time. Take time to write that card or to make a phone call because you can do that. and i and And we don't always give ourselves time. And I i think
00:27:59
Speaker
Yeah. Don't take it for granted. Like, like there are so many things going on, especially women growing businesses with one another to check that envy aside, you know? And and because the enemy doesn't want us to be loved with our friends and gaining hope and strength and allegiance, you know? So yeah, yeah. Like we, like, and friends are so important to the heart and to the journey.
00:28:29
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Yes, I 100% that resonates with me as you as you opened your piece of writing and you you named again so clearly like we never know. Yeah, you don't always know.
00:28:49
Speaker
you know that you're going to a friend's house for the last time, whether it's because a tragedy is is on the other side of that gathering you know that will take their life, or as you named, there is some level of betrayal that that is unbeknownst to both of you that that's coming, that will sever.
00:29:13
Speaker
sometimes irreparably. And I hate that. i want i I want to push against that and say it doesn't have to be that way. And and yet you and I have both known that despite our efforts for it to not be that way, sometimes that is still how it ends.
00:29:30
Speaker
Yes. um And and that that preciousness of every moment. Yes. And i think I think that's one of the things that I'll take from our conversation today is just the the remembering that not to waste not to waste any moment and to recognize that I have the power to choose. Yes. I have the power to choose how I want to be.
00:29:59
Speaker
with people who I want to be. um yes And to make choices that water, like goodness and long lasting longevity um and honor, I think. Yeah. I love that. To make, to water, to water.
00:30:22
Speaker
our friendships. And even when they are in disrepair or just moving apart because of the season, I think to number our days, to to have a heart that stays open and loving. And that can take a lot of work. But I think it does take a lot of work, yeah you know? um And isn't that our true self who we truly want to be?
00:30:53
Speaker
Well, and isn't that like, i that's the work of good women, Becky. That's the work ah of, if ah if a season of friendship is ending either just because of circumstances of life or perhaps because of a failure to love i in some in some way, that we still have the choice of who we wanna be.
00:31:18
Speaker
Yes, we still have and that I think is that that hard work that good women do to tend to the heart so that even if a friendship has ended, your heart can still have openness and can still have blessing and can still have graciousness and goodness.
00:31:38
Speaker
on the other side. I am nodding my head not that the audience can see that, but yes, yes, yes. It does not have to change the watering of our heart or the hearts whom we love. Yes.
00:31:55
Speaker
i can't i I don't think I can think of a better way for us to close. I agree. Yes. Thank you, Tracy, so much. So grateful to have this time together. Thank you. Thank you so much for saying yes. um ah And look forward to another conversation with you like this sometime soon. I do too. And my yes to you was life changing and continues to be.
00:32:24
Speaker
Well, it was life changing to me too, Becky. So there's a lot of mutuality there. The Red Tent Living podcast is produced by Katie Stafford and edited by Aaron Stafford. Our cover art is designed by Libby Johnson and our guests are all part of the Red Tent Living community. You can find us all at redtentliving.com as well as on Facebook and Instagram. If you love the stories shared here, we would be thrilled if you would leave us a review. Until next week, love to you, dear ones.