Yes, Susan - I suck at email

Pardon that personal message. My friend, Susan, left a comment in yesterday's entry asking me if I ever read and answer my email and the short answer is no. The more truthful answer is "I get to it eventually but I mostly spend a good week telling myself that I'll do it later and then eventually when I come across it again weeks later I finally answer the email.".

Here's the thing - Susan already knows this. I am the master procrastinator and Susan knows this as well as she knows my name.

Susan is one of the people with whom I have the longest friendship. I met her back in 1989 when we both worked for a utility company. We worked in the same department and were a notoriously incorrigible duo who escaped getting into trouble because our supervisors liked us so much. Except that Randy dude. He hated us. Of course the feeling was mutual and when we both quit to go work for a large online service company we didn't even wave buh-bye to him.

There's a certain comfort in having longtime friends. They have likely seen you at your very worst, helped you become your very best, know your quirks, remember all the goofy stories about you and know the cast of characters from your life. Remember Frank, the guy who enticed me to pull a plastic coat hanger over my head? She knows that guy! She didn't see the actual braining I took but she knows that story. She knows my ex-husband. I know her ex-husband. She's the one who talked me into adopting a cat and she's the one who was with me when I bought a good third of my Christmas tree decorations. She's cleaned my house. I've helped her move. If I said to her "...she had a good beating and it didn't do her any good!" she would not only know to whom the phrase refers but she knows who said it and why. We've shared fun times shopping and going out to lunch and taking road trips and we've shared frustrations and anger and depression. Friends like that with whom you've created a history are priceless if for nothing else than they know you inside out and like you in spite of it.

I lost touch with Susan for a while. My suckiness at email and calling when I should led to us disconnecting for a long while but as well as Susan knows I am pathetic with keeping in touch I know she's fabulous at making sure she keeps in touch. She called me out of the blue one weekend and we reconnected. She's always been that way. Susan would be the one to arrange for our group of girlfriends to get together and she'd hammer out all the plans. That's her all over. Planning and organizing come second nature to her and I am so grateful for it because it's kept me from stepping off the edge more than once.

Got an old friend you've lost touch with? Be like Susan and try to get in touch with them. I'll bet they'll be like me and be thrilled and thankful.

Back to the personal message: I'll answer the email! Promise! I wanted to download the pictures you sent to my computer but my hard drive crapped out and then I had it replaced and I've been working on loading stuff back on it and I didn't want to answer until I saw the pictures. How'd the move go?

Oh. Sorry. I'll take the rest to email.