A friend who listens

One day recently, the week before my daughter Ranna had surgery, I was feeling stressful. I had promised Ranna that I would go with her to a doctor’s appointment. I was trying to get caught up with everything so that I could take care of Ranna while she recuperated from surgery. And, I was supposed to have lunch with my good friend Suzie.

I thought about cancelling our lunch, but I decided that having lunch with Suzie was important. I finally told Suzie that I had one hour for lunch, and then I would have to leave so that I could meet Ranna at the doctor’s office.

As soon as we sat down at the restaurant, I started asking Suzie questions because she recently made a career change.

“No,” Suzie said, “we’re going to have a short time together. Today I want to catch up with what’s happening with Ranna and her health issues.”

Suzie spent the whole hour listening to me—and her listening carefully to me was a wonderful gift. I needed to talk and I needed someone to listen to me.
–Fayteen