Loving differently.

I finished Sisterhood Everlasting by Ann Brashares. It is basically a grown up ending to her Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series.  The women are all about 30 years old now and their lives are changing. I definitely do not want to ruin the plot for you (I dislike spoilers as much as the next guy) but grab your kleenex.  ESPECIALLY if you read the original series.
I remember reading all 4 of them in like 2 days when I was a freshman in high school.  I got on a kick of checking out books everyday from the school library.  I'm pretty sure I was the only one checking out books from the school library for fun, if not at all.
Anyway, when I read the original series and about halfway into Sisterhood Everlasting I really detested the character Carmen.  This was really annoying because Carmen narrates the books.  It would be like loving Sex and the City and hating Carrie.  Carmen just bothered me.  She complained a lot and seemed really lost in her life.  About halfway through this one though, I realized something big that we had in common.

(Real quick, because you need to know: These books are about 4 girls who were all born within a month from one another and had been best friends ever since, they loved one another as sisters.  While the original series centered on this pair of pants they all fit into, the real story has always been about their relationship.)

"There was a certain skill some people used when they needed to hunt and gather people to love and to love them.  Well, that was not a skill Carmen had developed."


"It wasn't that her heart was small.  She knew that.  It was big.  If anything, it loved too violently, too much.  But she couldn't expand its membership.  If she asked herself honestly, she'd have had to admit she didn't really believe she could."

Well that is me folks!  And it took me a really long time to realize it and come to terms.  Its not that I'm not friendly, I am.  But I really only consider a handful of people my true friends.  I think in high school it may have come off as snotty sometimes, and after I graduated and moved away from my friends it turned into seeming shy.  For a little while I got really depressed about it.  What was wrong with me? Why couldn't I make new friends? (Sidenote: I did make one amazing, lifelong friend in college)  And after I joined (and then quit) a sorority it finally hit me.  I have fabulous friends! I felt pressured, like something was wrong with me if I didn't have this artillery of friends at my disposal.  But, that is just not me.  I don't love in that way.  I give my whole heart to the people I love.  Every little bit of myself.  I am the friend that texts you things I think would make you laugh all throughout the day, every day.  I write you notes.  I cry when I talk about how much you mean to me.
I am certainly not trying to say that people who have 100 friends don't give all of themselves.  My sister is that way, and she is a wonderful friend to so many.  It seems everyday she has a new friend.  But her and I love in different ways.  My mom told me the other night she missed a call from my sister.  She got really worried and told her boyfriend (Chris) "I get nervous when I miss a call from Chelsi because she only calls about things that are important.  Not like Myranda. Myranda calls me to tell me she ate a good piece of broccoli." (I have never called her to talk about broccoli by the way. Asparagus maybe, but never broccoli)
But that is just me and Carmen, loving violently.  And thats okay. Everyone is different.

Buy Sisterhood Everlasting, its wonderful. Better yet, go check it out at the library!