Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Meet my friend Sarah.

I came to know Sarah when I was in sixth grade and attending a school I had been in since third grade (a private K-12 school). I had never met this Sarah girl, but somehow everyone else seemed to know who she was. I learned that her parents were missionaries in the Philippines, that this was their furlough year, and that Sarah had also attended my school in second grade – hence her fitting right in. Sarah and I had some mutual friends that year but didn’t hang out too much, although I do have a vivid memory of watching “Flipper” with her at her grandparents’ house.

It wasn’t until her family came back again for furlough three years later, our ninth grade year, that we really started to become great friends. We passed notes we’d written in the code Megan and I had invented in sixth grade, played our flutes together in band, and even did a dramatic reading of “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” together in an AP Literature class two years later. I was Rosencrantz and Sarah was Guildenstern. Or was Sarah Rosencrantz and maybe I was Guildenstern?

Regardless, Sarah and I have remained great friends through the years – she attended the same college as my brother, so I could visit TWO people with one trip to southern California. Now she lives in Spokane, and she came out to Seattle this weekend for a brief visit and to see her grandparents off on their cruise to Alaska. I so appreciated being able to see her grandparents again – I don’t think I’ve seen them since I last lived in my hometown of Greeley, Colorado, which was five years ago. We took them around Pike Place Market for a bit, and then roamed the Fremont Sunday Market with Sarah. Visiting with an old friend (going on 15 years now) is one of life’s greatest pick-me-ups – Sarah, I appreciate you!