Nov 2009, NYC gave me raging food poisoning.

April 2010, NYC gave me the flu or some type of virus that dresses like the flu. My roommate says, “fast onset, high fever, sounds like a virus to me.”

So. That’s neat.

I spent all of Wednesday on the couch, taking my temperature over and over and drinking tons of water.

Once I feel back over the weather [opposite of "under the weather"??], I’ll tell you all about my trip.

It was awesome.

Except the fluishness that now lives in my face.

Whah.

I’m not a super great roommate.

[Don't tell all those boyz that are clamoring to marry me, okay?]

I just get busy and throw my stuff around and forget to bring the spoons back in from my car [I like to eat yogurt on the way to work] and I accidentally delete shows off the DVR after I’ve watched them.

And I’ve had some rough roommate situations occur in the last five years.

These combine to make me skittish to live with friends that I love. In fact, so skittish that I almost didn’t live with Laura.

Laura and I moved in together in February, and I prepped for the worst. “She’s going to get frustrated with me,” I thought, “and then she’s going to stop liking me and we aren’t going to be friends anymore.” I saw the writing on the wall long before it happened.

I told Laura all about my roommate fears. I guess that’s the best thing I’ve done since we moved in together. I told her all my history, all my worry, and said, “when I say something snappy or defensive, I’m probably just scared that you are going to stop being my friend.”

[Because Nash has taught me that community THRIVES when people live wide open honest, even if it is ugly.]

Now, neither Laura or I are perfect. That is for sure.

But here’s what Laura did with my fears and my worries and my snappy-snapbacks: she put an orange in the fridge.

I didn’t have to tell Laura that I absolutely love oranges. I also didn’t have to tell her that I think the finest fruit experience on Earth is a cold orange. She just watched me, and then decided to love my well.

One day a few weeks ago she bought a bag of oranges and put one in the fridge. I saw it the next morning and said, “Ohhh… Laura. I’m out of oranges… can I have that one?”

She said, “Annie. I put it in there for you.”

I think Laura and I are going to annoy each other and make some mistakes in our time of living together. But I also think God has used (and is using) her to slay my fears. To show me that honest conversations are worth the nerves. That if I’m going to someday be a wife and live with my best friend, I have to learn to love in unexpected, but very loud, ways.

I’m glad that Laura is brave enough to live with me. I’m grateful that God has plans for me- not only for His glory, but for my healing.

And I hope that you find a way, today, to love your people well.

I’m watching people I love bend.

And I can see, in the not-too-distant future, the break.

The break isn’t always bad. It just seems that sometimes pressure builds up around a situation and in the days before the resolution, it’s high intensity.

I sat on my couch with one of my dearest friends a few weeks ago. My doorbell rang, I was all pajama-ed out, but I answered. Tears streaming down her face, I stepped aside as she crossed to my couch and began to weep.

For hours.

No talking. No explanation. Just one hand holding mine, the other covering her eyes.

And three days later, she told everyone that she was moving to New York to pursue her acting career.

It wasn’t sadness. It was a deep bend. It was the highest point of tension. She knew what she had to do, but the anticipation of actually making the change, telling her people, and giving up the safety of our beautiful little world, was too much.

It is that moment when you have to decide what God is saying, what obedience looks like, and to what level you are willing to obey.

I listened to another friend today, struggling. Deeply struggling. He wears sadness like a trench coat. And his eyes have stopped dancing. But in his story, I see the bend. I see that the breaking is coming. Nothing lasts forever and I’m sensing, by the depth of the hurt in his voice, that he really can’t bend much more. God will come. And the break will be a relief. A true break.

What is that they say? It is darkest right before the dawn? I’ve never been one for all-nighters or early mornings, so I don’t know if that is true. But I think it must be.

And then there’s me. I see the place in my heart that is bending. The tension feels high. The emotions [hi, my name is Annie and I am never-no-not-ever short on emotions] are running high. The unknown of the break is looming.

I fear it. I can see it in her move to New York, I can see it in his sadness, and I am full of hope for them both. But this bend in my life is terrifying. The break is soon, I just don’t know what it will look like.

My journal is full of the bend. The ears of my friends are full of bend talk. But none of it compares to what the Lord has had to deal with- I like to talk things out and bless His heart, He can’t get away from me.

But there is something really safe and Him being the Bender, the Breaker, and the One who loves me through it.

*FYI- some details about my friends have been changed. Because, well, they are my friends.*