Friendships That Last Forever

It’s cool how friendships are developed aren’t they? Think about this: Your close friends that you have, at one point, were complete strangers to you! Whether you met a year ago, or have known each other since grade school, friendships take time to build. Great friendships to me are ones that are honest, sincere, and encouraging. I am so grateful for the friendships that I have with so many of you. Believe me when I say that. Friendships have had a huge and positive impact on my life. More importantly, friendships are important to everyone!

 

My friendship with Justin Cole is one in particular that I would like to take a second to write about today. Why people wait until funerals to share about what a person has meant to them I do not know, but I’m a firm believer in giving credit and praise where it is due. One look at Justin and I, and one would wonder how we are friends. Justin and I are nothing alike. He’s white, I’m mixed. He’s a country boy, and I’m a city kid. He’s reserved and analytical, and I’m outgoing and spontaneous. We don’t always agree on everything, but we respect each other’s opinion immensely. We are the closest of friends, and he has been there thru thick and thin for me. It made me realize how important it is, and how rare it is to have a true friendship. As Proverbs 27:17 states ”As Iron sharpens Iron, so one man sharpens the countenance of another.” I believe this is an exact example of my friendship with Justin. We talk or text almost daily, encouraging each other, bouncing ideas and opinions off each other.  This is just a little highlight reel of my friendship with my good friend Justin. Included are attempted bits of humor.

August 2008- I remember the first time I met Justin, was my first day checking into the Marine Corps unit in Grand Rapids. As a Pivate First Class, I was wary of everyone I met for fear that another Marine  of higher rank might snap on me for being somewhere I wasn’t suppsed to be or invisibly doing the wrong thing. I was pretty much on egg shells. I stood off to the side of everything that was going on. “Was there nobody else a PFC in this unit?” Finally I spotted another PFC like me, just off to the side. I walked over. “I’m Mehari.”

                                                       He extended his hand, “Hey, I’m Cole.”
Wary of being associated with the wrong type of Marine, I watched Cole like a hawk that drill. He had been there one month longer than I, so I stuck around him since he seemed to know what he was doing.  He didn’t get yelled at, didn’t say much to anybody, but went about and conducted his business as if he had been there a year.  Being that we were the only two PFC’s in our platoon, we got stuck doing everything together. EVERYTHING. Mopping floors, cleaning bathrooms, 2 AM fire watches and working parties. Yet I never heard him once complain….ever. And that’s how we became friends.

                #1- Get a friend that doesn’t complain, and pulls their own weight.

Nov 8. 2009- Marine Corps Ball. I couldn’t wait to tell Justin the news…I knew it would just eat him up. “Hey Cole,” I greeted him.  “So, I just got a suite.” I paused then delivered my casual shot. “What did you get again?” Justin looked down at my receipt, then back up at my grinning face. He then calmly took my receipt, dialed the number, and requested his own suite. He then hung up the phone and turned around, “I’m sorry what did you say?”

                #2. Get a friend who isn’t afraid to go round for round with you

May 2010-It was about 3:35 Am In the morning and I was tired beyond words. I walked over to Justin.   “Wanna take your break right now?” He couldn’t have agreed more, his eyelids heavy. We walked over to the break room and sat down. “Bro,” I said, “Earlier when we were out there unloading the crates, I fell asleep standing up. I never even knew that was possible.” Justin and I decided to take jobs working 3^rd shift at Meijer for $7.55 an hour in addition to the already 40 plus hours we were working at our other full time jobs. We were working 80 to 90 hours a week. Justin shook his head. “I know I fell asleep with my car in park, keys in the ignition, and engine running…” I stopped. “Seriously  Cole?”

 “Yah…”

“Don’t worry man, we aren’t gonna be here forever.”

 

#3. Get a friend who wants to succeed in life as bad as you do….

Aug 20. 2010- @ 0200- I was shook awake. “Hey Mehari, you have fire watch” a voice said, then disappeared.” We were on week 1 of training in the cold mountains of California. While it was perfect weather in the day ( tramping around in 75 degree weather, with snow on the ground) the nights were unforgiving. Without the sun, the temps dipped into the teens, and snow fell. The wind blew all night, offering no relief. To make matters worse we had no natural barriers to offer us protection from the elements. I shook myself out of my warm sleeping bag, gasping as the cold wind whipped thru my cammies. It was COLD. I reached for my rifle, grabbing its frozen barrel and walked to my pack for water. No luck, the water had froze inside my canteen. I had an hour of walking around until I was relieved. I went to go find the other fire watch who was stamping his feet to stay warm. Whoever it was, we would suffer together at least. “Hey brotha, welcome, quite the night eh?.” It was Cole.

#4. Get a friend who can instantly make a miserable 2 AM fire watch better. 

April 16, 2011. 4:27 AM. “Dan grab the pen, if he makes a move, stab him.”  In a cost saving move on a road trip to New York City, we spurned sleeping in a hotel, opting instead for the comfy leather seats of our Buick Lacrosse luxury rental car. We drove around New York/Jersey until I found a huge, abandoned parking lot where we could agreed would be suitable to sleep. With both of us being wary of he neighborhood, I picked a spot in the very back corner of the parking lot, underneath a huge willow tree.  I backed into it, knowing that we could see anything coming up on us. We leaned our seats fully back, and closed our eyes. Resting, but not sleeping. A few hours later, lights splashed acrossed the windshield. I raised up on my elbows, wondered if it was cops checking our suspicious vehicle tucked far away and hidden in the lot. Instead a sketch 15 passenger van and a ford explorer approached our car slowly, unaware of us and our seats all the way back. “Cole are you seeing this?” I whispered. “Yeah man.” I glanced at the clock. They were 5o yards and closing. “You got a knife on you?”

“It’s in my bag… in the trunk.”

“That’s not very helpful.”

We began silently searching for weapons in the car. All we had were pens. By this point the cars had crept up on us, and boxed us in. The 15 passenger van on my left, and the Ford Explorer directly in front of us, and the tree and fence behind and to our right. Cole and I were so low that the people inside hadn’t even seen us. “Dan, grab the pen, if he makes a move stab him.” The guy in the van got out. I hit the automatic window button, and popped up. “Excuse me can I help you?” The guy recoiled as if he had been hit with a shotgun blast. “No! Uh! Sorry dude, we saw this car here and thought it would be ok to check it. “So you boxed us in?” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Justin uncapping his pen. The guy continued to stammer“Uh, no dude, sorry, uhh….” He quickly turned and retreated back into his vehicle and both vehicles took off. They say friends don’t let friends go to jail. They are right there beside them in the next cell over. Would have been true had the guy continued….

#5 Get a friend who is willing to save money by sleeping in a car, and then even more willing to throw down at 4:30 in the morning…

August, 2012- Justin’s wedding day.  Do I even need to explain this one? It was awesome. Justin and Courtney. Awesomer. Reception? Probably one of the best nights of my life. There is nothing better than being surrounded by friends and family in celebration. I can stake pride in the fact I’m an honorary Cole family member.

#6. Get a friend where you are also friends with the spouse. It’s a win-win. Everyone is happy.

 April 2012- Wind is ok. Sand is ok. The desert is ok. Those three combined over a period of time, well, can make life straight up miserable. Sand does not discriminate. It found itself in my food, in my socks, in my rifle, and in my sleeping system. The day usually ended with chow as the sun set over the desert plains. Usually this is where Cole and I would gather, huddled around the Humvee’s to protect sand from getting in our chow and recap our days. Sand was everywhere and our burnt  faces must have been a sight to see. “You look terrible.” “Yea, well thanks, so thoughtful of you.” Yet we found ways to make the best of our situation. “It’s crazy to think that God created all of this,” I said, my eyes scanning the endless desert as we sat crunching on sand filled chow. “That’s a great point, kind of makes you wonder why someone wouldn’t believe in a God.” “You got that right.” We would usually end our conversation there, our thoughts elsewhere as we sat in each others company.

#7 Get a friend who isn’t afraid to be true to themselves.

Isn’t it awesome how friends encourage each other? I’m truly thankful for a friend like Justin. He has been a solid , reliable and a true friend. There aren't very many people in this world that I would trust with my life, but Justin is without a doubt one of them. I could go on with more stories of our friendship, but thats an ongoing story! It however, wouldn't suprise me if at ages of 70, we were two old men in rocking chairs shooting shotguns off the back porch.

#8 Never underestimate the value of a true friend.