Friend #12 - Sarah

There are old souls that inhabit the earth, beings of youth who exhibit such natural wisdom that one starts to wonder if they really even fit in this generation of selfies and YouTube makeup tutorials. 

I met Sarah by working with a local non-profit.  She is the type of unyielding dependable that you never have to worry about anything being left undone.  She’s a little bit of ‘Little House on the Prairie’ with her long, blond hair and her natural heart-shaped face.  Her voice is soft.  Her eyes are warm.  She’s the type of person you instantly feel you have known for years.

You’d think she was from the Midwest from that description but Sarah actually grew up near Buffalo, New York, surrounded by farms for as far as the eye could see.  She loved to ride horses.  In fact, for a while, she considered becoming a horse trainer but she never had a horse of her own.  She was raised by a single mom and horses are expensive.  So Sarah learned her skills by riding and taking care of other people’s horses.  It didn’t mean she loved it any less.

She moved out to California for college with big dreams of working with professional athletes but an internship in the community relations department of a professional sports team changed all that.  What Sarah really loved was connecting with people, forming meaningful relationships.  She realized that the important things in life were not the materialistic ones.  It was the people in her life.  It was the people she could help.  So Sarah changed her focus and after college began working in the non-profit world. 

With her long blond hair, you would think Sarah would be the quintessential beach beauty, perfectly fit for Orange County but Sarah has a simple, rhythmic beat to her life that doesn’t match the crowded alcoves of Southern California.  In fact, she always felt a bit out of place.  She was looking to escape when a friend of hers took her to a party where she met her friend’s boss…and fell madly in love. 

Kevin builds medical technological devices that help us live.  He’s a smart guy with a solid income and, like Sarah, simple in his own way.  There were numerous times when their paths should have crossed in ways reminiscent of “How I Met Your Mother”.  Once, Sarah stayed with some friends in a room that had been vacated by the roommate for the weekend.  Turns out, it was Kevin’s room.  He was the roommate.  They both moved to Arizona for a while but their entire four year relationship has been plagued with distance.  It never deterred them or weakened their commitment to one another. 

So when Kevin moved back to California in January for a job, it never occurred to him to leave Sarah behind.  But Sarah wasn’t thrilled about the idea of living in California again.  To her, California represented all of the materialistic things that she is not...even though Kevin settled in Northern California, which is very different than the southernmost part of the state. 

Kevin found a cute little house nestled onto twelve hundred acres for them to live in with plenty of room for Sarah and her Siberian Husky, Molson, to explore.  Still, Sarah struggled to let go of her feminist side, the one that demanded her independence.  Sarah’s mother had always been her role model of making it on her own, yet the tender whisperings of husband and family were whispering in her ear, pulling her back towards the west coast.  And then Kevin uttered the words to the vision that would finally make Sarah’s decision complete:  There was enough land and resources for Sarah to finally have a horse of her own.  For Sarah, it would be the completion of a dream. 

As Sarah told me the story, I realized this was Sarah’s goodbye to me…but it is the beginning of a beautiful new chapter of her life.  She will again live amongst farmland.  She will be able to cultivate the deep, personal relationships she loves to have.  She has found a job at another non-profit that she believes will be even more fulfilling than the one she left behind.  And maybe…just maybe…there will be a ring.  The discussion, at least, has been there. 

At the end of this week, Sarah will move and the Arizona chapter in her life will close.  And for me, for once, I’m just happy to be a part of a happy ending.