Twenty

I get to be best friends with this cute girl every single day...

...and today she turns twenty!!

Taylor, I heard this poem read on a movie a few weeks ago and it immediately brought you to my mind. You are my friend, my sister, the one I tell all my secrets, the one I trust most. I love you... and I carry your heart with me, my sweet friend.

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

-'I carry your heart with me,' e.e. cummings

"But Ruth replied, 'Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you.

Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay.

Your people will be my people and your God my God.

Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried.

May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely,

if anything but death separates you and me.

When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her,

she stopped urging her."

Ruth 1:16-18

Our friendship is centered on Christ and has been from day one (when you asked me for that ride). (: Taylor is the best kind of friend- the kind that will write you every day you are away (and even writes every day that she is away). For much of our friendship, Taylor has blessed me by picking me up when I fall, lifting my spirits when they're down, and shining a light in darkness that has threatened to surround me. She is my go-to when I need an ear to listen or a shoulder to cry on. We always play hard and laugh even harder (at ourselves and definitely at each other). Her home has become my second (and for a while, my first) home and her family, my second family. I am thankful for the photographs that I have to look back on to remember how much fun we've had together, what a beautiful gift she has been to me every day for the past 4 years, and how often she has reached out and pulled me up.

"There was a man all alone; he had neither son nor brother.

There was no end to his toil,

yet his eyes were not content with his wealth.

'For whom am I toiling,' he asked,

'and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?'

This too is meaningless- a miserable business!

Two are better than one,

because they have a good return for their work:

If one falls down, his friend can help him up.

But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up!

Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.

But how can one keep warm alone?

Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves.

A cord of three strands is not quickly broken."

Ecclesiastes 4:8-12

Tay, you are precious! I am grateful for you daily and I'm excited for a day to celebrate you from sunrise to sunset. You deserve to be celebrated- because you are a gift. I firmly believe God encourages and Jesus exemplified surrounding ourselves with people who build us up, challenge us, hold us accountable, and most of all love us through the good and the bad... and you, my friend, are exactly that person in my life!

You mean more and more to me every day-

Happy Birthday, my dear!

I love you,

B