Friendships are a funny thing.
Have you ever spent time thinking about how you met each one of your closest friends?
I do it a lot, and it is fascinating.
I have friends who I’ve met through church, and that isn’t necessarily the biggest deal because those people are obviously like-minded and looking for community. Don’t get me wrong, several of my best friendships originated at church.
Today, though, I want to write about the genesis of a couple of serendipitous friendships.
I graduated from college in December of 2014. At the end of January of 2015, I got a call from a company that was interested in hiring me. They found my résumé on Monster, and they wanted me to come in for an interview.
After a two-hour interview, I got offered the job. I thought about it over the weekend and accepted the following Monday. They wanted me to start on Wednesday, February 4th.
The company was growing, and they were also looking for an accountant. In April of 2015, they hired someone for that position.
I didn’t really talk to her until August of that year. We talked about her dog and glasses. We exchanged numbers. A month or two later, we spent an entire day at a Starbucks together. She has always been easy to talk to. I trusted her with my bipolar diagnosis very quickly.
It’s just amazing to me how our paths crossed; she almost wasn’t hired because she lived too far away. We wouldn’t have met if we weren’t both hired when and where we were, and I feel incredibly blessed to be her friend.
I’ve recently made another friend, and the way we met was even more unexpected. I started working for a different company last year, and I work with our suppliers.
One of our suppliers is out in Rhome, Texas, which is about an hour away from where I live. The sales rep wears many other hats, and on my first visit last year we really hit it off.
I shared my blog with her, and we corresponded over email a few times. We didn’t see each other for a year. After my second visit, I wanted to exchange numbers with her, so I emailed her and gave her my number.
We’ve texted almost every day since then. She’s a bit older than me, but she said the other day she sees me as a younger sister. We have a lot in common, namely our core values. We’ve only been texting for a month, but we are already great friends. We’ve opened up to each other, and I am looking forward to many more years of friendship.
I love stories like this. Stories of kindred spirits meeting in surprising ways.
Maybe I’m weird, but I’m okay with that.
Between Two Poles 