Post-Schna-ulations

A glimmer of hope

Just when I thought I had lost all faith in humanity...
Well, not really, but it made for a dramatic beginning. 
Seriously though, it has been a long time since I have had any sort of encounter with the general public (outside of my own group of friends, that is) that has been exceptionally positive.  HOWEVER, in the past two weeks, I have had two moments that went above and beyond the expectations I had come to have of people.  One was from a good friend, but it went above and beyond all expectations I would possibly have of a friend. The other occurred today at the seamstress shop.  I will tell the latter first.
I am in a wedding this weekend for a good friend I've known since I was young (I avoided saying 'little' here so that I wouldn't be mocked....I've known her for a foot...in other words, I was four feet tall when we met and I'm five feet tall now.  HA!).  ANYWAY, as the wedding is in Wisconsin and the dressed came from the burbs of Chicago, I was not able to try on the dress.  SO, I sent my measurements to the bridal shop so they would order the correct size.  I put way too much trust in people to be intelligent.  They orderd me a size that was SO HUGE, not only did I walk all over the skirt (which is to be expected), but the top didn't even border on being decent.  So I took it to the seamstress.  Many dollars later, I get the dress back.  The skirt was easy...just had to be hemmed.  The top finally fit, but did this weird buckling thing in the front.  This was due to way too much material.  So I took it back to see what she could do (she being the seamstress).  Today, I picked up the top (which doesn't buckle..yay!  it would have been so much better of course if they had just gotten the size right in the first place!).
She didn't charge me anything.  I was dumbfounded.  True, she had fixed it in the first place, but when I got it back, it DID fit the way we had pinned it.  I just didn't realize the problem until I got the chance to move around in it a bit.  ANYWAY, I don't know if it's a good thing or a sad sign that this seems like such an exceptional thing to have happened.  Alas, I will just be extremely happy that the dress fits, it's done in time for me to leave tomorrow, and I didn't have to pay any extra.
 
The second story involves a good friend from college.  She lives in Michigan in a house right on the lake (Lake Michigan, that is).  This summer, she organized a big reunion for the sorority to which we both belonged and through which we met (yeah, yeah...laugh all you want.  I was in a sorority).  I was able to find a ride out (Thanks V!) , but no way home from the reunion.  Too poor to fly or rent a car, I had resigned myself to not going.  Now, said friend, whom we shall call Benz, has been wanting to come out to see me since I moved back to the midwest (east?  i don't know...), to no avail.  SO, she offered to buy me a one-way plane ticket from Michigan to Pittsburgh (via Chicago Midway..woo hoo!).  Honestly, reading the email she sent (in which she made said offer), I was struck dumb.  No words (and that's a big deal for me!!). 
 
So, the point of telling this story...to speak to the other, positive side of things.  There is a lot of shit going down, true.  However, there are still people who do honest work and still friends who would give whatever they can just to see you for a weekend.  And so, while this could totally be turned into an episode of Seventh Heaven or Everwood (or insert family oriented WB show here), things aren't all bad.  :) 
 
OH, oh...back to the wedding thing...I am flying out tomorrow night for Chicago.  That means that, post tomorrow and pre-Monday, there will be very little (if any) posting from me.  However, I'm sure I will have plenty of stories post-weekend (I'm digging this whole post- pre- thing). 

posted by Schna @ 4:20 PM