On Mountain Friendships
My life has been rich with friends. My cup has runneth over with good, loving, sweet people who have been very good to me. Some of these people I have known since I was 12, almost 40 years! The friends I made in school feel more like family, like sisters, and no matter how rarely I get to see them, they still mean the world to me. We are still here for each other after all these years. I love them. I would do anything I could for them. They say that you don't ever make friends again in life like the ones you made in high school. I believed this myself until recently. But no longer.
When I moved to Missoula, Montana 7 and 1/2 years ago, I didn't know anyone here. I expected to make friends quickly because I had never had a problem making friends before. Well, much to my surprise, it wasn't as easy as I expected. The people here were lovely, warm and friendly, really nice, but because most of the women I've met here have full-time jobs and because of the remoteness of where I lived, making good, close friendships proved to be not only difficult but near impossible. This situation was distressing for me. I had never not had friends to talk to, lean on, go to dinner and a movie with. I experienced a couple of years of barren, desert wasteland in the friend department. I was LONELY. I was starving for girl time. I missed my friends back home! As time went on I began to begrudgingly accept the situation. I had tried so hard and so many different things to make these relationships work but simply put, it wasn't happenin'. I lived too far from town. Everybody worked and had families and were too busy. Even my nearest neighbor and (eventual) mountain friend Sue who worked was gone all the time and we just never saw each other. Sigh .... oh well. My long-distance friendships would have to be enough for now. I guess.
Then things started to change. We had more people move up here on the mountain. It used to be pretty much just us and Tim and Sue, but now! So many people! And you know what I discovered? Mountain friendships are different. They are essential. Indispensable. Cherished. Amazingly special. They are to be cultivated, fed and protected. And you know why? Because we need each other up here. The circumstances of living on top of a mountain in Montana, off-grid, with ten tons of snow each year are difficult to say the least. And sometimes, whether you want to ask or not, you need help. You are going to need help at some point, there's no way around it. So you need each other, at times desperately. And because you need each other so much, you care for these relationships, you forgive more easily, you go out of your way in ways you never have before, you discover a whole new meaning to the word 'friendship'. You realize that this is what it's supposed to mean, this is what it should have been all along. You see that you have discovered real treasure on this mountain that is better than silver or gold.
When Boone, our Golden Retriever puppy, went missing, many people up here, without being asked, went out to hunt for him, for hours. And hours. When we got snowed in a couple of years ago and were in real trouble but didn't want to ask for help, here came our mountain friend Tim on his big ol' tractor around the corner plowing for all he was worth. He saved our bacon that day. When Butch was living in the barn while building the house, it got down to -30 one night and Sue came up and told Butch to get in her car, that he was sleeping at her and Tim's house that night, NO argument. When I mentioned on Facebook (thank God for FB!) that Butch was having trouble with his back and that he might not be able to get home because it snowed so hard, our friend Sharon sent our friend Jeremie up here with her plow truck to plow us out, again, without being asked. When I was depressed one year at Halloween because I was missing my kids, Sue and Tim and two other friends showed up all dressed in costumes with a huge pizza as a surprise for me, to cheer me up. And it did. When our road became an ice slick this year and I was afraid to drive on it, my friend Shirley came up here to get me and took me to town to run a full day of errands. What fun we had! Our Texas friend Ron who has a cabin up here heard me complain about cold feet and he gave a nice pair of boots and socks to me so my feet would be warm. I could go on and on and on.
I am so touched by their constant generosity, their thoughtfulness, their willingness to go out of their way for others and be real, true neighbors. I have never known friendship like this before. I am overwhelmed with gratefulness. I am humbled by their actions and love. They show me that there is still amazing goodness in people, that there is true beauty in the human soul and how we were meant to be. And how I want to be. Mountain Friendships. What a discovery. What a treasure. What a gift!
When I moved to Missoula, Montana 7 and 1/2 years ago, I didn't know anyone here. I expected to make friends quickly because I had never had a problem making friends before. Well, much to my surprise, it wasn't as easy as I expected. The people here were lovely, warm and friendly, really nice, but because most of the women I've met here have full-time jobs and because of the remoteness of where I lived, making good, close friendships proved to be not only difficult but near impossible. This situation was distressing for me. I had never not had friends to talk to, lean on, go to dinner and a movie with. I experienced a couple of years of barren, desert wasteland in the friend department. I was LONELY. I was starving for girl time. I missed my friends back home! As time went on I began to begrudgingly accept the situation. I had tried so hard and so many different things to make these relationships work but simply put, it wasn't happenin'. I lived too far from town. Everybody worked and had families and were too busy. Even my nearest neighbor and (eventual) mountain friend Sue who worked was gone all the time and we just never saw each other. Sigh .... oh well. My long-distance friendships would have to be enough for now. I guess.
Then things started to change. We had more people move up here on the mountain. It used to be pretty much just us and Tim and Sue, but now! So many people! And you know what I discovered? Mountain friendships are different. They are essential. Indispensable. Cherished. Amazingly special. They are to be cultivated, fed and protected. And you know why? Because we need each other up here. The circumstances of living on top of a mountain in Montana, off-grid, with ten tons of snow each year are difficult to say the least. And sometimes, whether you want to ask or not, you need help. You are going to need help at some point, there's no way around it. So you need each other, at times desperately. And because you need each other so much, you care for these relationships, you forgive more easily, you go out of your way in ways you never have before, you discover a whole new meaning to the word 'friendship'. You realize that this is what it's supposed to mean, this is what it should have been all along. You see that you have discovered real treasure on this mountain that is better than silver or gold.
When Boone, our Golden Retriever puppy, went missing, many people up here, without being asked, went out to hunt for him, for hours. And hours. When we got snowed in a couple of years ago and were in real trouble but didn't want to ask for help, here came our mountain friend Tim on his big ol' tractor around the corner plowing for all he was worth. He saved our bacon that day. When Butch was living in the barn while building the house, it got down to -30 one night and Sue came up and told Butch to get in her car, that he was sleeping at her and Tim's house that night, NO argument. When I mentioned on Facebook (thank God for FB!) that Butch was having trouble with his back and that he might not be able to get home because it snowed so hard, our friend Sharon sent our friend Jeremie up here with her plow truck to plow us out, again, without being asked. When I was depressed one year at Halloween because I was missing my kids, Sue and Tim and two other friends showed up all dressed in costumes with a huge pizza as a surprise for me, to cheer me up. And it did. When our road became an ice slick this year and I was afraid to drive on it, my friend Shirley came up here to get me and took me to town to run a full day of errands. What fun we had! Our Texas friend Ron who has a cabin up here heard me complain about cold feet and he gave a nice pair of boots and socks to me so my feet would be warm. I could go on and on and on.
I am so touched by their constant generosity, their thoughtfulness, their willingness to go out of their way for others and be real, true neighbors. I have never known friendship like this before. I am overwhelmed with gratefulness. I am humbled by their actions and love. They show me that there is still amazing goodness in people, that there is true beauty in the human soul and how we were meant to be. And how I want to be. Mountain Friendships. What a discovery. What a treasure. What a gift!
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