Adventure, Finale (For Real!)

On July 31, 2008, I Googled Pastor and Fran.

That's how it all began, folks.  I'm ashamed to admit it, but I lost them.  We had left Germany in July of 2005.  Pastor and Fran retired from Ministry to the Military and left Germany sometime in 2008, and I didn't know where they were.  When I Googled them, I found Sharon's blog, where she had written about a trip she took with Fran to my favorite place on earth for a women's retreat.  Seething with jealousy, I left her a comment explaining briefly who I was and asking if she knew how to get in touch with my beloved P&F.

Sharon emailed me with their whereabouts and contact info, and all was right with the world.

It might have ended there, but it didn't.  We started reading one another's blogs.  Sharon would leave comments on my posts with sweet, encouraging words like:

Oh, never mind.  I just spent an hour (in the middle of the night) looking through ancient blog posts to try and find some of Sharon's sweet, encouraging words.  When I finally found them (after seriously reading through most of 2008) I realized that they are too sweet and too personal to share.  You'll just have to trust me.

So.  Sharon: sweet and encouraging.

And Karen: usually all shades of green jealousy at the brave, daring life and wild adventures Sharon shared.  My sweet and encouraging words were like, "Please tell me your kids fought on this trip," while really, truly hoping they had fought.

Over the years (years!) we shared life through our blogs and through emails. 

• I traveled with her to Ireland, Malawi, Croatia.
• She went with me to pick up a child from school while wearing a (green) facial mask and watched me otherwise generally stumbling through life.
• I tried my hardest not to drop dead with jealousy at her seemingly golden life.  She was doing, physically and spiritually, on her own and with her family, things I only wished I was brave enough to do, and she wrote it all out so beautifully, so poetically, for me to read.

Once, immediately after I posted a request that my bloggirls sign and send me this:

"I ______________, take my responsibility as reader/editor/friend extraordinaire to the Author Known as Karen Klasi.  I will keep this manuscript in my possession, never show it to anyone else, read it with all due diligence, and make any and all suggestions that come to mind, truthfully and with love, for the betterment of this novel.  I will share no part of the manuscript or plot with anyone, and I will return said manuscript to Karen in a timely manner.  Then, I will not be the least bit offended if she chooses not to heed my brilliant suggestions."

Signed______________

I received a letter from Sharon  containing those exact words.

(She is still waiting patiently for that manuscript.)

And then.  Then the icing on the cake.  Then, she did the thing that sealed her title as Perfect Stranger by sending an email that caused me to write the following post:

The Luckiest Girl

Once upon a time, there was a girl who loved pottery from Poland. She loved it so much, in fact, that she traveled there three different times and spent fairly ridiculous (according to her husband) amounts of money on the stuff. She loved it all-- the blues, the yellows, the greens, the oranges and the deep rust reds. It didn't matter the shape or size, she loved it equally and with much enthusiasm. So great was her love that when, in the course of human events, two of her large, beautiful bowls were broken, she cried real tears of loss. She mourned that broken pottery and searched with World Wide Web for someone, anyone who might replace it for her. Two years later, she still had not found this person, and still she felt the loss. It was a tragedy of epic proportions.

And then.

She met, quite by accident, a blog girl. This blog girl had the good fortune to be living in Germany, exploring that universe, and loving every minute of it. Truth be told, the girl kind of hated her (you know, in a why-can't-I-be-you kind of way), but was drawn to reading about her exploits all the same. Over time, they realized that they had many things in common and began to really like each other.

And then.

The blog girl emailed the pottery girl and told her this: We are going to Boleslaweic and will hunt for your broken pottery.

The pottery girl was IN AWE. What kind of a person takes up the hunt for the broken pottery of a girl she's never met? Seriously. I'll ask again. What kind of person does this???

The pottery girl pondered this question long and hard.

And then.

The doorbell rang. As she opened the door, the girl figured out the answer to her question. The kind of person who does this is selfless, loving, compassionate, a little bit crazy, and very much like Jesus.

The End

So now you see, right?  Now you see why this was a meeting of kindred souls, years in the making, and worthy of this telling.  You see why that hug was not the hug of strangers.  You see why we could talk for hours and never be anywhere near out of words.  You see, perhaps, why it was the most natural thing on earth (okay, maybe just on Karen's Earth) to meet immediately after having a chemical peel.  You see, I'm certain, just why I was so thrilled to finally meet this Perfect Stranger.

And now you've met her, too!