My friend R and I talk on the phone once or twice a week. For like an hour or more each time. She’s three thousand miles away in Washington, I’m three time zones ahead. Which means when her boys wake up early at 6:30am and the day is stretching out long in front of her, she’s got someone to call. And when I’ve gotten the kids off to school and sat down to a quiet cup of tea, the phone rings and it’s time to chat with a good friend. There are blessings in a long distance friendship. Too often though, she feels too far away.

Like yesterday, when she called at 6:45am my time – that’s 3:45am her time – pretty sure that those contractions she was having were real labor this time. (I told her to call me when she went into labor, ANYTIME, day or night, but it was convienient that she called only ten minutes before my alarm was set to go off.) We talked for a few minutes, and I listened to her try to keep an even tone and breathe through the contractions. The streets in her neighborhood were covered in a layer of snow and ice. I suggested maybe letting an ambulance take her to the hospital, rather than trusting their front wheel drive van. I worry like that. She assured me they’d be fine.

A couple hours later, she called again, to say they’d made it safely out of her neighborhood and were on the way to the hospital. It wouldn’t be long now. Her last labor was quick, she progressed from 3cm to 10cm in only 45 minutes.

I prayed. Often.

Another call, around lunchtime. The epidural was on board, but progress had slowed. She was bored. I wished I were there, sitting at her bedside, holding her hand, chatting about meaningless fluff to pass the time and give her husband a break for a few minutes. Instead I prayed some more.

A longer time went by. When Husband called I jumped on the phone, and then did my best to hide my disappointment.

Finally, around dinner time, the phone rang again.

“Yes?”

“She’s here. And N (her husband) is setting up Skype so you can see her.”

I run to my laptop and pull up the video phone program. The miles fall away. My friend is there, in the kitchen with me, and I am there, in the hospital by her bed. What miracle is this, this video phone. The baby is beautiful and perfect and amazing.

“What is her name?”

I ask once, twice, but we talk over each other. Then her husband says, “First we need you to do something.”

Do something? Me?

“Go to your family room, and get the dictionary on the shelf to the left of the fireplace.”

What is this? They have never even been to our house. I’m confused and intrigued at the same time. I rush to the family room.

I grab the dictionary and run back.

“Now open the dictionary to the word Secret“

Oh my word! There’s an envelope tucked in here. But how? Husband, of course. He plotted with them, though even he didn’t know what was inside the envelope.

A card from R, with a note and a suprise.

A decade ago, not long after we adopted our daughter R~ from Cambodia, our pastor asked me to give a talk at church for national adoption month. R and her husband N went to our church, and were there that day. They’d been trying to start a family for many years. God used that talk to open their hearts to adoption. They had questions. I was more than happy to share our story and all the things I’d learned. Soon R and I were talking, often. And when she was in the process for her son from Guatemala, I was in the process for my son from Vietnam. There is nothing more valuable than a friend who truly knows what you are going through when you feel like you are drowning in paperwork and the road to your child just seems to get longer and longer. Our friendship was forged in those fires. She’s one of the only really solid sister-heart friends I’ve made since college.

A few years ago, R and N were suprised at the beginning of their journey to adopt a second child. They were pregnant. It wasn’t supposed to be possible. And yet nine months later they had a healthy beautiful baby boy.

This time, two and half years later, God blessed them with a perfect baby girl.

To commemorate our friendship and the many miracles that have come about since that day when God gave me the words to speak in front of our church, R and N chose to tuck my name in the middle of their daughter’s. I’d tell you her name, but they both value privacy online just like I do. But let me tell you, it’s a really pretty name. And I’m not just saying that because “Christina” is in the middle of it.

I am so touched. And honored. But most of all, Blessed. That they would make such an effort to involve me in such a momentous and significant day, with phone calls and video chatting and even a secret tucked away in my own house(!)… and on top of all that, to grant me the honor of sharing a name with their beautiful perfect little miracle. Wow. Just wow. God is good.

Now about that move back to Washington…

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