This is one of my favorite quotes from this past weekend, when Shulamith and I traveled to St. George to attend the wedding and celebrate the marriage of my friend Patty's daughter, Lindsey. There were other great lines as well. This one came from Patty's brother James, whom I met for the first time at the reception Saturday night.
Backstory: Patty and I only lived together for one brief semester during our junior year in college, but somehow (and it's rather remarkable, really), our friendship has endured the test of both time (three decades) and distance. I wrote about that here, so I won't repeat, but suffice it to say that one of the coolest parts of this past weekend was putting faces to names of the many people in her life, whom I've come to "know" though never actually met.
Her brother James is one of those people. The closest I came to meeting him was during the semester Patty and I were roommates, when I helped her bake cookies for him. So Saturday night I introduced myself like this: "Hi, I'm Terrianne, and once upon time during college days, I helped your sister bake cookies for you." As I was leaving the reception, he said, "Well thanks for the cookies. They were good."
Then there's Patty's niece, Clarissa. As Shulamith and I sat in the waiting room of the temple prior to the sealing, I tried to figure out which one she was. I'd seen pictures on Facebook, but it was still hard to be sure. There were two cute, blond girls, and I figured one of them had to be she. I was right! I confirmed with Patty's sister Claire after the sealing and then introduced myself to Clarissa: "Hi, I'm Terrianne. I've "watched" you grow up (virtually) for most of your life," to which she replied, "Well that's scary!"
Finally, the very best line of the evening...no, the entire weekend...came out of a dinner conversation with Patty's sons, Tyler and Jacob. I had actually met Tyler once before when he and Eli were seven months old, and Eli and I visited St. George. Tyler and Eli crawled around the living room, while Patty and I reminisced about college days and chatted about marriage and motherhood. Twenty-four-year-old Tyler didn't remember that day at all. In fact, he had no idea who I was or how I knew his and Jacob's names.
He may not remember, but I feel like I've known both these amazing young men all their lives. At one point, Shulamith asked both brothers how they feel about their sister's new husband. Jacob said they like him just fine, though they don't really know him that well yet.
Then Tyler chimed in:
"But I'm sure my mom knows him very well. I'm sure she's been interrogating him nonstop since the first day she met him, just like she does us. Question after question after question, until finally you just give up answers, anything to make it stop: "Please, Mom, I need to go to the bathroom!"
Two things: Tyler could be a stand-up comic, and Patty is a mother after my own heart.
"Thanks for the cookies. They were good"
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