Moving to Illinois was hard for me.  I went from being roommates with my younger sister and living three miles from my parents, and three miles from my older sister to being two hundred miles and a time zone away.  In Indiana, I was at a school that I loved, and worked with great people.  It had been my dream job because I was close to home.

But alas... I fell in love with a military man.  On the day we got married (yes, I'm aware it was the hottest day ever) he was in the middle of initiation for becoming a Chief.  We weren't sure if or when he would be transferred, so we had decided to live separately that first year of marriage. 

When he got transferred to Illinois a year later, it was time for me to leave the nest, and finally live with my husband. The toughest part for me was that I didn't have a job lined up for the following fall.  I had started working at 16, sometimes two jobs at a time, and to be making the change to unemployed was really an adjustment. 

Things fell into place and I got a job at an amazing school with amazing people.

But this post isn't about them.  Soon though.

This post is about my reward.  I had told James that if I got a job, after all the stress of not having one, I was going to reward myself with day at the spa.  I had no idea of where to go, and had just driven by a place, so I called and asked for a mani and pedi.  They scheduled me with the cutest, sweetest, stylist ever.  "Miss A" was one of the very first people I met here.  In the four years since I got my job, she's the only person I've gone to.

Over those four years, even though I've never seen her outside of the salon, I've counted her as a friend.  She knows all about my life, and I feel like I've gotten to know about hers.  We know about spouses, and children, and the "important" things.  I ALWAYS look forward to seeing her, not just for the stylist side, but for the social side.

While I had a couple of terrible months last year, she had just a terrible year!  She lost a sister and a child within a matter of months.  The fact that she functions today still amazes me.

Last night I had an appointment with her.  For the first 30 minutes we just stood there and talked, hugged, and cried together.

While my grief is SO very different from hers, it was comforting to me to be there with her.  To be there with her and be able to talk about loss, and love, and faith, and grief.  To talk about the thought of healing, or finding the new "normal" was good.  To know that some of the silly things I think or do, are not so silly made me feel a little more sane.  To see that she understood my panic attacks, how her thoughts about funeral homes had changed so much like mine, or that she could understand why I had gotten upset over a balloon popping that my mom had blown up....

I am not alone.

I knew this.  I know this.  But it was really good to be reminded of it again last night.