Old Friend

I love old friends.  Especially when they come back into your life.

I made friends with Jan back when I was working for Jefferson Bank.  As a payroll person in those days, I went to the Ceridian Insight's Conference in San Antonio.  Being my first ever Convention, I went to the beginner's meeting where we were clued in on how things worked and given hints and helps to make the conference worth the money my company was spending to send me there for a week.  Jan sat next to me at the Beginner's meeting and we struck up a conversation.  We found ourselves going to several of the same classes and we spent most of the week enjoying each other's company.

She was from Nashville and then later moved to Maryland, around the D.C. area.  We saw each other again in Orlando and over the time I was involved in HR and Payroll, we talked about different things when we had questions about proper procedures.  I even drove down to see her once and she took me on a tour of different sights in Washington, D.C.

From time to time she would call me but I had not heard from her in a while.  She had moved to the D.C. area to be near to her only child... a daughter... and her family.

She has struggled to keep in jobs that would support her in the expensive area they live in.  But she had tired of being in charge of areas where the company owners were trying to take short cuts in payroll to have a better bottom line.  So she is currently without work.

She called me recently just to catch up.  She is having difficulty finding work.  But she is also having trouble dealing with her daughter and her family.  I do not know all of the things going on, but there is a great deal of stress and tears and sleepless nights.

Until now, I have wondered why I have had so many unhappy things in my life.  Divorce, a child running away from home, job losses and most recently death of my parents and my husband.  I know that everyone goes through these things at one time or another.  No one goes through life completely unscathed.  But I have been able to do some quick prayers and digging deeply into my experiences to help her stop and think about things so she can deal with them.

I am grateful for my experiences.  I now see a purpose for everything in just being able to help my friend.  We may not have been the kind of friends who ran around together, went to movies or had afternoon teas.  But from the first week in San Antonio, we have had a special bond.  And I am hoping that we will continue to be there to help each other.