Be somebody's Cait.

* * * * * 

Today is Tuesday. On Tuesdays I watch devotional on a big screen in an old room with my friend-for-life Cait. I met her when I was ten. Now we are big and have bigger lives and offer two hours of them each week to each other. The first is spent in front of this big screen, pre-maturely eating our lunches while listening to inspiring people speak. Cait's lunch is different from mine in that it always looks... well, planned. Her sandwiches have turkey and condiments AND vegetables. Like straight up spinach and pickles or something. Kind of like her outfits... an accessorized sandwich. Whereas the hope of my potential PB and J lies within the second pocket of my bookbag, which was filled in a flurry this morning by a jar of peanutbutter, my blackberry jam, a butterknife straight out of the drawer and two loose slices of bread. I forgot napkins. We don't have those in my house. Today I borrowed her poppyseed salad fork to eat out of my half-frozen by a ghetto-fridge disposable yogurt container. I didn't bring anything else, not even a spoon. The food is funny, but it's not the point. The speeches are beautiful... it helps to just sit and learn for an hour because you're actually choosing to.
But really, they're not the point either.

The point is hour #2.
We find a spot. A spot for...
"Lunch"
The food was consumed early for a reason people. It's time to talk about the week.
"Okay so tell me stuff..." I say.
(I usually feel unprepared to verbalize, so I always want Cait to go first.)
This hour. Each week. Has become Absolutely Vital for my heart.
This semester. Each week: A full-feature drama occurs in my life.
On the better weeks, it's a romantic comedy.
But never uneventful. Never without a struggle.
(Also, never fruitless.)

"I don't feel like I'm dumping or venting when I talk to you because we don't wallow. We search."
--Cait

I need to have my own world here with Cait sittin on the floor, over in the corner...
only inches away from 20 or so other college-kid conversations.
We are here.
With our words we spread out the roughly drafted blue prints...
The beginnings of a few answers...
We tear-up over the hard ones,
"I'm not sure what else I can give to this."
take pictures with the good ones,
"I can feel it. I'm whole now. I've always been, but I didn't know."
hold on for the hopeful ones.
"Imagine what it will feel like after ten years of work to feel what you've finally made together."
We figure out what we're gonna do next.
"Tell me what you felt when you prayed..."

I trust Cait because she is kind. Because I've never met someone who's intentions are so undoubtedly pure. Because since we were ten she's had this calm ability to face life.
Not with a set identity and something to prove,
Not with a shield of pretense,
but with a heart ready to reach
Ready to receive.