Weekend Reflections

There are some weekends that are fun - and then there are the weekends that quietly remind you just how damn lucky you are.

This weekend, Melissa and Jamie came to stay with us, and somehow we managed to pack adventure, laughter, questionable physical activity, a few drinks, and two grown men digging holes in the yard into a couple of days.

Basically, perfection.

We Voluntarily Climbed a Mountain. For Fun.

We decided to take Melissa and Jamie on a little Vermont adventure to the Brookfield Fire Tower at Allis State Park.

Now, when someone says “fire tower,” my brain apparently pictures a cute little staircase with a scenic view at the top.

My thighs would like to formally dispute that description.

That damn tower has approximately 47,000 stories. Okay, maybe not, but somewhere halfway up, my legs started filing complaints with management.

But once we got to the top? ABSOLUTELY WORTH IT!

The view was incredible - the kind that makes you stand there for a minute and realize how ridiculously beautiful Vermont is. We live surrounded by this stuff every single day, and sometimes I think we get so busy with work, chores, dinner, laundry, dogs, bills, and general adult bullshit that we forget to actually look around.

This weekend made me look around.

The Boys Had a Playdate

Saturday afternoon, Melissa and I did what any supportive partners would do while the boys broke out the metal detectors.

We sat outside with drinks and supervised.

And by supervised, I mean we drank, talked, laughed, and watched Jet and Jamie wander around our 200-year-old farmstead absolutely convinced they were moments away from uncovering buried treasure.

They did find treasure - if your definition of treasure is enough rusty old car parts to potentially assemble a 1947 Ford in the backyard.

Every few minutes, one of them would come over excited about whatever piece of metal they'd just yanked out of the earth, and Melissa and I slowly realized something:

We were basically two single moms who had taken our boys out for a playdate.

“Look what I found!” That's wonderful, honey. Go show Jamie.

They were having the time of their lives, though, and it was honestly adorable.

No gold. No ancient coins. No mysterious stash of money hidden by some farmer 150 years ago.

Just two very happy grown men, a couple metal detectors, approximately 600 pounds of rusty automotive debris, and two women drinking in lawn chairs watching the whole operation unfold.

Sometimes You Need to See Home Through Someone Else's Eyes

We spent so much of the weekend outside - eating, exploring, sitting around, talking, laughing—and it made me appreciate our little slice of heaven in a completely different way.

Sometimes you get so used to where you live that the extraordinary starts feeling ordinary.

The old farmstead. The land. The quiet. The views. The history underneath our feet - apparently mostly in the form of abandoned car parts.

Having friends here enjoying it with us made me stop and think, Holy shit. We actually get to live here!

And I never want to become so accustomed to it that I stop appreciating that.

But maybe my favorite part of the weekend wasn't the fire tower, the treasure hunt, or even watching our grown-ass men happily play outside.

It was getting to know Melissa again.

Same Women. Completely Different Chapter.

I originally met Melissa about three years ago through people connected to my relationship with my ex, Steve.

And when I think about the woman Melissa met back then compared to the woman sitting across from her drinking in my yard this weekend...

I am not the same person. Not even fucking close.

That version of me was living a completely different life, in a completely different relationship, and honestly still figuring out who the hell I was and what I wanted.

And Melissa was in her own chapter, too.

I don't think either of us were in a place back then where we could have appreciated the kind of friendship we're capable of having now.

Three years doesn't sound like a long time until you look at everything that can happen

inside of it.

Life happened.

Relationships changed. Priorities changed. We changed.

We've grown. We've been humbled. We've worked our asses off. We've learned some things the easy way and plenty of shit the hard way. We've built homes, relationships, careers, and lives we're proud of.

So sitting outside with her this weekend felt almost like meeting each other again.

Except this time, we're showing up as the women we are now.

There was something really special about sitting outside Saturday afternoon with nowhere we needed to be, drinks in our hands, our boys happily digging up the yard like unsupervised eight-year-olds, and just talking.

Not surface-level bullshit.

Real life.

And I think this weekend was the beginning of a much deeper friendship than the one we were capable of having three years ago.

Maybe some people aren't meant to walk into your life and immediately become your people.

Maybe sometimes you meet them early.

Then life knocks both of you around a little, teaches you some shit, helps you grow—and brings you back together when you're finally ready to truly appreciate one another.

This weekend reminded me that you can live somewhere beautiful and still forget to look at the view.

You can meet someone wonderful and simply not be the version of yourself yet who is ready for that friendship.

And apparently, you can have a 200-year-old farmstead and the only buried treasure waiting for you is half a fucking Buick.

Still pretty damn lucky, if you ask me.