And It isn’t Even Christmas!

Sep 19, 2017 by Jeanette Hanscome

I just received a book in the mail that I hadn’t ordered and wasn’t expecting.

As soon as I saw the title, I knew who’d sent it—the same friend who slipped me this cute box after a lunch and shopping trip on Saturday, before we headed to Starbucks for coffee.

We’d been chatting about writing off-and-on all afternoon—what I was working on, what she was working on, ideas that sounded like the answer to our “What’s next for me, God?” prayers until they fell flatter than a batch of chocolate chip cookies that doubles as a lesson in why you should never melt the butter. She asked if I’d ever read How to Blog a Book, and told me how much she enjoyed reading my posts. Maybe I had the content for my next book right here on my blog, or at least a ready-made topic.

Before I had a chance to order the book (or find a reason to delay ordering it), she sent it as a gift.

I felt thoroughly spoiled. Why were people being so nice to me this week? On Friday, I’d gotten a surprise from another friend, who decided that I needed more than the picture of an old typewriter that hung on my wall, or my Write Brave journal with butterflies fluttering out of one; I needed the real thing. My love of old typewriters was one of those random comments that slipped out so casually that I had to remind myself that I’d told her. But she remembered. And when she saw one at an antique fair, she bought it for me.

[bctt tweet=”Why were people being so nice to me this week?” username=”JHanscomeWriter”]

It wasn’t Christmas or my birthday or anything!

She gave it to me on a day when I needed a reminder that, though I was still tending to wounds inflicted by some pretty messed-up people, God had filled my life with even more wonderful people.

Friends who support and encourage me as I write.

Friends who pray for me and let me pray for them.

Friends who hear my most random comments and notice what I admire in stores.

Friends who have not only hung in there with me through a long recovery process, but truly wanted to be part of it.

I guess God decided I needed several reminders this week.

Today, as I saw my typewriter on display in the living room, and wondered what to put in my prayer box first, and got ready to start reading How to Blog a Book, I realized that some of my most treasured friends are in my life, or in my life more, because of the wounds I’m still tending to.

I connected with them after moving back to the Bay Area.

For the first time, we lived close enough to see each other more often than at a yearly writer’s conference.

We discovered that we had not-so-fun things in common, but also fun things, and between the two we had a lot to talk about.

One friendship has grown since I started seriously tending to my wounds; she usually picks me up from the weekly appointment, and we make a tradition of hanging out for a while afterward.

In the process, they have reminded me what friendship looks like, and what kind of friend I want to be.

God really does work all things together for good.

 

When has God used unwanted change, or even a painful experience, to open the door for friendships that you wouldn’t have had otherwise?

 

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who[a] have been called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28 (NIV)

[bctt tweet=”God really does work all things together for good.” username=”JHanscomeWriter”]