I decided to challenge myself this week spiritually and physically by fasting.  It began at midnight Tuesday morning, and I plan to end the fast at lunch time on Friday, which will be about 85 hours.

That’s 85 hours of nothing more than coffee and chicken broth.

Oddly enough, foregoing food has not been as difficult as I anticipated.  And for someone like me, who might be able to turn eating at a buffet into an Olympic event, that’s saying something.  But it is something I really wanted to do for a dear friend who has had a major impact in my life.

The main reason for the fast is to pray for Archie and the rest of the team at South Bay Church in Northern California; their first preview service, the culmination of several months of work and prayer, happens this Sunday.  It’s a moment that they have really worked hard to reach, and I hope you will join me in wishing them all well.

If you missed the “Arch-a-thon” I held back in August, and you’d like to know more about this incredible guy, just click the “Arch-a-thon” tab and start reading.

In any case, if you’re so inclined, please say a prayer for them that things would go well for their first service.

Two nights ago, while he was working out at his gym, a friend and co-worker of mine started feeling funny.  He was working out on, of all things, one of those elliptical cross-trainers that I’ve joked about as being something straight out of Hell itself.

He felt pain in his jaw, numbness, dizziness, and other “classic symptoms” that no one wants to feel.  Fortunately, he made his way to the locker room, where a friend of his saw that something was wrong and got him some help.  He was in the hospital within a few minutes and was treated for a “mild” heart attack.

He is expected to be out of the hospital some time today.  Less than 48 hours after having the attack itself.

How extraordinary.

This guy, I’m sorry to tell you, isn’t lazy, isn’t overweight, and doesn’t park himself in front of a television like he has nothing better to do.  This is someone who regularly goes to the gym, regularly stays active, watches what he eats and makes far more of an effort than most of us to do stay in shape.

His doctors are still trying to figure out why the attack even happened.  The good news is that my friend says there’s no damage to the heart itself.

He was lucky.  Very lucky.  And I’m very thankful.

I think I enjoy Facebook a little too much.

It’s nice to keep in touch with the few people I actually I’m close to, and it’s even nice to be able to say hello or with a happy birthday to older friends I haven’t seen in years.  I guess, in some way, that’s keeping in touch, too, but not really.

Facebook is one of those social networking sites, for those who don’t know, and once you add someone as a friend, especially if you’re new to the program, it will suggest other people you may know.  One of the most reasonable ways it does this is through showing you the friends of the person you just added, as if to say, “Well, hey, Patrick, if you know Harold, then maybe you know Maude.”

(I don’t know Harold or Maude; it was just an example.)

If you join a local group, it will sometimes suggest people who also are members whom you may know.  And your friends can suggest people they think you know as well.

There are several ways to get your “friend” count up fairly quickly.  If you’re into that sort of thing.

One of the most amusing ways, though, is along the sidebar of your “dashboard” page, the page you see when you sign on that updates you on everyone who has left you a message or updated their status in one way or another.  Under “People You May Know,” there will be three photos and names.  In most cases, there is some justification for the system’s suggestion.  “Renee also went to _________ High School,” or “Paul is in the _____________ group as well.”

My favorite is, “Kyle also lives in Charleston.”

They say the world is getting smaller.  But there are more than 609,000 people who live in the Charleston metro area.  The world is not nearly so small that I know all of them.  I’m relatively confident that there are probably at least 608,800 of those folks that I don’t know at all.

I guess I could just “friend” them, anyway.  (In social networking sites, the word “friend” becomes a verb, unlike in real life, where having a friend requires being a friend.)  But I usually don’t, because I’d rather focus on people I actually know, or at least know of.

There are a lot of people who have thousands of friends on these kinds of sites.  Good for them.  I’m not sure what they do — probably nothing — to maintain thousands of friendships, but if they can make it work, more power to them.  It just seems to me that there’s a cheapening of the word friend in randomly “friending” anyone and everyone.  Maybe that’s just me.

Of the friends I have on my account, there are still well under a dozen that I’d really consider serious friends.  There are only three or four on that list that I feel like I could really count on at a truly critical moment.  That I know in my heart that I can trust to be there when I need them.

Just three or four.

That makes me very fortunate.

Before leaving for California, my friend Archie gave me a book called The One Year Daily Grind.  It’s a daily devotional written in the style of daily blog entries, and the tag line on the cover reads, “Grab a mocha and spend some time with God–every day.”  I like that idea; I need to spend more time with God.  I’ve needed to for a while, but only in the past year or so have I really begun to realize the extent of that need.

The entry for September 3rd, titled “Quiet Desperation,” recalls this familiar quote:

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
— Henry David Thoreau

In this particular day’s entry, author Sarah Arthur talks about looking out of her window and people-watching, something I like to do from time to time.  She wonders how many people are living a life in which they have no concept of God, and who therefore have no concept of the hope that Christ’s death and resurrection represents.  She writes that imagining how many people may be in that boat is enough to make her depressed even though she has “been given a kingdom that is unshakable,” a reference to Hebrews 12:28.

I think there are plenty of us who know God and who still have those moments of desperation.  A lot of people who aren’t Christian seem to think that Christians always think we have all of the answers.  We don’t, but it’s our fault that we give that impression, because we tend to get so cocky about things just because we feel that God has our back.

It would be so much easier if accepting Christ was the moment that we got every answer to every question, that we could suddenly know, beyond any doubt, that we were on the right track.  There would never be any need to re-evaluate who we are, why we’re here and what we’re doing with our gifts.  Then again, I guess that if there was never a need to ask ourselves such questions, there’d be no more opportunity to grow.

Off and on for the past few years, I’ve been feeling my own kind of quiet desperation.  That there’s something out there waiting for me that I’ve just managed to not take any notice of, and that I need to find.  If that doesn’t make a lot of sense to someone who reads this but may not know me personally — which I imagine is most of the people who read this little blog — then don’t feel bad; it doesn’t fully make a lot of sense to me, either.  But that’s the best way I can describe it.

But I know that something has been missing.  I’m happy professionally.  I’m not inordinately unhappy personally.  (How’s that for diplomatic?)  But there’s something more that I know I should be doing, and I’m only beginning to start figuring out what that is.  I have a pretty good idea at this point, because it has been needling me for a while now, first as a whisper, but more recently — particularly in the past year and thanks to a good friend — as something more clear and pronounced.

And it’s still a scary thought.

But change is supposed to be a little scary, right?  Stepping out of a comfort zone, no matter how small the step happens to be is supposed to be a little unnerving.  Even if you don’t actually leave the confines of the comfort zone…if you just take a baby step here and there towards its boundary, that’s a frightening proposition.  Otherwise, I suppose there’d be no such thing as a “comfort zone,” right?

But I think that not taking the steps, once you start to realize what they are, can only lead to more quiet desperation.

So yesterday was a big day for me.  It was an emotionally-rough but spiritually-fulfilling day.

I saw my friends Archie and Rebekah for the last time — in a while, that is, but definitely not forever — at church yesterday morning.

After the service, Archie and I spent a little extra time together in his old office there.  We talked, laughed, exchanged gifts and prayed together.  He led me through the rededication prayer, which was wholly appropriate, because Archie has really been able to help me refocus my life in areas I hadn’t realized had become unfocused where God was concerned.

In my church, we talk about “God moments,” those times when we believers know beyond a doubt that we’re spending genuine, quality time with God Himself.  (If you’re not a believer, that’ll sound silly, I know.  I wish I could explain it better so you’d understand.  Short of that, picture a good time with a close friend: that’s what it feels like.)

Archie and I shared some really incredible God moments in the past year, and yesterday was the ultimate one for me.  Archie gave me a couple of books to read and some CDs of music he really likes.  It was an unexpected but really nice gesture on his part.

Eventually, they’ll come back to Charleston when they can to visit their friends and family here.   I will definitely visit them out there.  We have each others’ email addresses and phone numbers.  And there’s always Facebook’s live chat as an option.  We’ll stay in touch; of that I have no doubt.

But, as the saying goes, it won’t be the same.   Not like knowing they’re just 20 minutes away and that I can call Archie up on a random afternoon, ask if he’s had lunch, yet, and if not, suggest that he and I meet up at our regular hangout.

It was tough watching him drive off in the parking lot.  But at the same time, I still had a sense of new peace in my heart and excitement for them over what they’re going to be doing with their future.  Tomorrow, they actually leave Charleston and head to California, where they will be part of a team that will start a new church out there.

It’s a bittersweet time here at my place.  And today’s sort of the “in between” day where I’m reflecting on so many good memories and trying not to think about what tomorrow will feel like.

There’s so much good I know that they’re going to do, because they’re both the genuine article.  But I’ll miss them here.  They’re following God’s call, and there’s no greater thing I think anyone can do with his or her life.  But that call is sending them so far away.

Bittersweet.  Normal, right?

I love those two.  They’re incredible people in a world where incredible people seem increasingly hard to find.

If you’re so inclined, please say a prayer for them as they embark on the next part of their incredible journey.

Last night, I got to see my friend Archie lead worship one last time before he and his wife, Rebekah, move out to California to start a new church in the San Francisco Bay area.

It was awesome getting to see him perform one more time.

It was bittersweet, too. But I figure there’s a pretty good chance that you already guessed that part.

The title of this post should actually contain a little asterisk that refers to a footnote that reads, “One last time…at least for now.” I’m definitely going to start banking some courage for another 4-hour plane ride some day.

I hate flying.  But in this case, it’d be worth it.

Meanwhile, if you live in that part of California, some amazing people are heading your way soon! And if you’re not careful, before you even realize that it’s happening, they just might change you.  For the better.

That’s what they managed to do to yours truly.

You may well ask why I would write nearly 50 posts to try to raise funds for people I’ve only known a year and could, conceivably, never see again for the rest of my life.  (After all, to get to see them, I’ve got to get up enough courage to get on an airplane for a four hour flight!)

Actually, I think I will see them again, and I don’t just mean that in a “70 years from now up in Heaven” kind of way.

Well, let me answer it this way:  if, after reading these posts, you come away thinking, “Wow, that Patrick is really a nice guy,” then I have totally failed to make the right point.

I’m not a nice guy; I’m the most self-centered person I know.  By a long shot.   This blog is about me…that’s why it’s called Patrick’s Place.  But this weekend isn’t about me.  That’s why it’s called the Arch-a-thon.

It’s about them.  It’s about their dream and how they’re serving God in fulfilling that dream.

It’s about setting aside the sadness of seeing them move away, and there’s a lot of that.  It’s about helping them, however I can, actually make that move that ugly, selfish side of me doesn’t want to make.  It’s about lifting up these two folks whom I admire so much.

And it’s about Proverbs 17:17, and thanking Archie for having been there for me.

That’s what it is about.

Adjustments are almost never easy.  Because they usually involve resetting our comfort zones.  And our comfort zones are comfortable because they don’t change.

Thus the conundrum.

At this hour, church is just letting out.  On the first Sunday in which Archie has officially “left the building.”

It’ll be fine.  It’ll be okay.

Change happens, and in this case, for a good reason.

I’ll be fine.  I’ll be okay.  Because I know this particular change is happening for an awesome reason.

Things were not meant to go on forever the way they are right this second.  Life happens.  (And don’t you just want to slug whoever came up with that little phrase?!?)

But think about it: if nothing was ever meant to change, we’d never get married, have families of our own, relocate here or there, form new friendships or grow in any way.

We’d just stay with our parents and never go from diapers to big-boy pants.  And that would not be pretty.

So we have to find ways to celebrate changes, even when we don’t like them.  I learned that lesson — or kind of did — earlier this year in the old workplace, where some responsibilities I had and enjoyed were basically reassigned and I was suddenly shut out from doing those particular duties.  It stung a little, I’ll admit.  And it felt like an insult to my intelligence when a manager tried to deliver the “change is good” speech.

Change often doesn’t feel good at the time.

But change is good.  Change is necessary.  It’s how we grow.   And like it or not, it’s often what we need.

So I decided that I’d try to put my friend Archie on the spot with a set of questions. It’s sort of his own personalized “Saturday Six” on a Sunday. Here goes:

Q: What made you decide that you wanted to be a pastor?

A: For me it was something that chose me. My Dad was a pastor and ‘you know what they say about those pastors’ kids’ but I didn’t really get to that until I was in College. I just felt from early on that I was going to be a part of something really big. I still feel like that.

But when I was a kid I wanted nothing to do with being a Pastor, I wanted to be a pilot. I saw some of the struggles my Dad had as a pastor and I didn’t want anything to do with that. We went to a terrible church, the people were mean to my family, it was boring, and the old people made it smell funny. Ever been to that church?

But that all changed when I was in 11th grade. I went to a men’s event with my Dad and I really felt God doing something in my heart. I really had this overwhelming feeling that this “something big” in my heart was being a part of what God was doing on the earth: namely, being a pastor.

That was great and I really felt good about that until I went to school on Monday and was made fun of a bit. I kind of floated through the rest of that year and my senior year not really knowing what to do with this new-found calling. I went to College and it was the first bit of real freedom I had tasted. Eight hours away from home was, in my mind, perfect. Most people, when their parents leave them at college on that move-in weekend cry a little bit, especially when you go to a school where you know no one else. Not me. I was like, “don’t let the car door hit ya in the rear on the way home.” Not that I didn’t like my parents but I was ready to start my life.

That first year I went a little crazy with parties and girls and cussing and stuff — it was fun for a bit but I knew that I was called to more than the life I was living. I had a professor that pulled me aside one day and told me that he saw a lot of potential in me and that I needed to get my act together. So I started going back to church and getting involved again and really trying to hear from God, because something had changed in me that I wanted to be anything BUT a Pastor. But that year I couldn’t get away from it; there was nothing else that I thought of doing that sounded remotely fulfilling. Nothing else that I had a peace about.

And I decided one night at College while playing the piano in a dark room by myself that I would tell God, “I will do anything you ask me to do,” and, “I will do my best to always follow you.” When you say things like that to God, we always get scared that He is going to ask us to sell everything we have and move to Africa (I know I was scared about that) and that He was going to ask me to stop doing music.

But what I have found out was that a lot of times he shapes our hearts for the things he will call us to. And we find that a lot of times our desires are His desires, too. Like my desire to do music, or that I love being around people. He will use the gifts that He’s given us to His benefit. And when the things He asks us to do are difficult or when we feel really weak, He promises that He is at His best when we are at our weakest. (2 Cor. 12:9- “My grace is enough for you, my power is made perfect in weakness.”)

Q: You’re already a musical quadruple threat with singing, arranging, drums and guitar: what else would you like to do musically that you haven’t so far?

A: I have always wanted to write my own music. I really feel like my main gift in music is as an arranger, to put in cool little bits that weren’t there before. I have written a few from time to time but really want to make some more time for this. My Brother, Sam (who plays drums and some guitar), and I have begun writing some original stuff and are planning on recording this coming spring when he gets to California. I would really like to release an album on a record label or at least sell it at my church or something. I think I have struggled with writing because sometimes I think, “I don’t have anything to say, or my stuff wont be good enough.” It’s very scary to record things because once you do, it’s out there! People can say what they want about it or take it for granted. All the while, you’ve spent over a hundred hours making something for it to end up under someone’s car seat with some stale french fries. But I think that is just part of our culture to constantly want “new and exciting.” But long story short, I want to write and record my own stuff instead of just arranging my cool parts that I’ve written into someone else’s song.

Q: What are your favorite television shows?

A: The Office, 24, Modern Marvels, Myth Busters, How it’s Made, (don’t tell anyone but So You Think You Can Dance) I watch this with my wife. Most anything on the History Channel, or Military Channel.

Q: Does the attention you’re getting because of your departure make you uncomfortable?

Not really. It’s actually a little humbling and a good reminder that we really do have friends that love us and care for us and want to see the best for us. It has been great in these last few weeks because you get to say all the things that you really do feel for some people but never say. Like, “You changed my life” or “Thanks for everything.” I think that we too often get too caught in our own little worlds to help people or to appreciate another human being for the beauty that God has placed inside them.

But it’s times like these when you can say, “A month from now I won’t be here,” it makes you change the way you interact with those closest to you. It has to, or this time will just float off and blend into the past with all the rest of the friendships that have faded by time and distance. But you can say to those closest to you, “We may not always be able to go to Mexican at the drop of a hat anymore, but thank you for being a part of my life and loving me, and being a friend; and I hope I have done the same for you.”

Q: And you have. Next question: What’s a goal in your life that you think most people would be surprised to hear about?

A: A couple of things I think might surprise people are that I would like to get my pilots license and I would like to go on tour singing my own music with my brother.

Q: Final question: I can’t let a pastor get away without asking, “What’s your favorite bible verse?”

A: 2 Cor 5:17:

“Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has gone, the new has come!”

I love this verse because it reminds me that there is always hope to be a new person. If you don’t like who you are today, change. God tells us in another verse that “His mercies are new every day.” He gives us so many opportunities for forgiveness and second chances. And this verse is telling us that when we are in Christ, we are new. The old has gone away but he offers newness everyday.

Thanks for your answers, Archie.

I hope everyone reading these posts will consider making a donation as Archie and Bekah pursue a dream to do God’s work in California. Click here  for more information. Coming up at 11:00am in the Arch-a-thon, I’ll embarrass myself in the name of friendship by running my high school senior portrait, so be sure to check back.

Pastor Steven Furtick of Elevation Church in Charlotte recently did a post on his blog about valleys, quoting a well-known verse:

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”

—Psalm 23:4

He then makes a good point about valleys: we all will face them, and we will all come out of them.

When I feel like I am in a valley, there’s that piece of advice from my 7th grade teacher that I have mentioned before about just taking the problem and “giving it back to God.”

Some problems don’t seem to be the kind you can just hand over. I have a hard time of letting go of certain problems. Sometimes, even after they’re solved, I have some guilt about how I handled things or how I didn’t handle things. I play the whole hindsight game of, “Why didn’t I do it this way?” or “Why didn’t I think to try that?”

Some problems contain elements of good and bad. That, in case you haven’t figured it out, is where I am at the moment with the thought of my friend moving across the country. I feel like I’m in a valley at times in this, because the selfish part of me realizes that I can’t just call up Archie at the drop of a hat and end up meeting him for lunch up the road any longer. I won’t be able to talk one on one, in person at least, when something’s on my mind. And I won’t be able to just hang out with him and talk about things that have little to do with religion and just spend that quality time.

The selfish part of me, I’m sorry to admit, isn’t handling that particularly well. Okay, let me be realistic: the selfish part of me is failing miserably.

The unselfish part of me, which hasn’t seen a great deal of daylight in the past couple of weeks on this particular matter, is already out of the valley and waiting the rest of me to get over it and join the rest of me so that I can watch Archie and Rebekah follow their dream. After all, what more can you hope for when it comes to your close friends? You want them to follow their dreams, you want them to succeed.

And for believers, when that dream happens to mesh with God’s call in their lives, well, it just doesn’t get any sweeter than that.

So I’m still working on the valley thing. And I know that I’ll haul that ugly side of me — I’m convinced the selfish part of me is also the fat part of me, so it’s a lot to haul, thank you very much — up to the next crest and I’ll be able to set aside my own sadness. When I’m ready.

And hopefully sooner than that.

“Put me in this dumpster!”

This isn’t the type of thing you ever hear many people tell you. Especially not a television news anchor. But it happened to me, and it’s a funny story I thought I’d share.

This was probably about eight or nine years ago, and the television station I worked for at the time was about to undergo a major nightmare: changing its news set. A set change is a particular nightmare when there’s only one studio and the new set will pretty much take up the entire thing. (That’s because there’s suddenly no place to have the old one while the new one is being built.)

Behind the old, crappy little set, was a little vanity and shelving for various people’s make-up collections. The engineers, who were only too happy to rip the old set apart, had posted several notes and emails to “talent,” which is a term used to describe the on-air people, warning them to remove all of their personal belongings by a specific date or it would be tossed out. A giant dumpster had appeared behind the building, as if to reinforce this point.

All of the anchors had taken some degree of action in terms of removing their belongings from this area. But people who work in TV are notorious for not cleaning up their messes.

One anchor, who was doing weather and some reporting at that time, had gathered all of her make-up and cosmetic paraphernalia neatly into a Tupperware container. Unfortunately, she still left the neatly-organized Tupperware container on the vanity behind the set.

And engineering made good on its threat. The next morning, the old vanity and everything that had been with it, her Tupperware included, was gone.

As I recall, I was there working late — or maybe working early — and I heard the clip-clop of women’s high-heeled shoes. It was a loud clip-clop, as if the person generating it was either really angry or trying to power-walk like those seniors at the mall.

Before I could close my edit bay door and pretend no one was there, she came around the corner and saw me.

“My make-up is gone!”

“Gone?” I hadn’t seen anyone actually throw anything away, but I had guessed that it was what had happened.

“Where did they put everything that was behind the set?”

“Well, I think they threw it away.” That’s what all of those notes said, I did not add.

“My TUPPERWARE?!? Where would they have put it?”

“Probably that dumpster right out back.”

“Come on,” she said and stormed down the hallway.

I think, just as she turned away, I caught a glimpse of real fire in her eyes. Even though this particular anchor was only about 5’6” or so, I was smart enough not to ignore a direct order. So I followed her out the back door to the large dumpster. She peered over the side, on her tiptoes, searching for any glimpse of her Tupperware. Then, she saw it.

“There!” She pointed at a heap of lumber. I didn’t see anything that remotely resembled Tupperware, but I moved closer to where she was and saw about a fraction of an inch of something that looked like it might be made of plastic. It was clear that she had a stronger-than-usual attachment to this particular container if she could recognize such a small sliver of it. Then came the famous line:

“Put me in this dumpster!”

I lifted her up over the top so she could climb in and start rooting around for her prized Tupperware and its contents. I only wish I’d had a camera handy; this would have made that night’s news one way or the other.

I heard her mumbling, even growling, as she realized that the lid had come loose — the engineers must have failed to properly “burp” the Tupperware — and her makeup had spilled. She gathered each piece, as steam began coming out of her ears.

Gathering the last piece, she glared at me, realizing how hard I was laughing at her. I helped her out of the big green monster, and the clip-clopping began again, back into the building. She was headed, undoubtedly, for whomever cleared out the studio. As she turned the corner, she said, “Somebody’s gonna have a bad damned day.”

I’m just glad it wasn’t me!

So I have a confession to make about this little Arch-a-thon. (And I’m not even Catholic!)

I am actually not typing these posts back to back, half-hour by half-hour. A good bit of this little event has been written in advance. There are two important reasons for this.

First, I am, by nature, a procrastinator. Even for things that are important to me, like helping Archie and Bekah, I still manage to procrastinate. Archie will tell you that this is another thing he and I have in common, along with being Sagittariuses (or is it Sagittarii?) and being lousy at basketball (although when it comes to athletics, I’d always bet on him over me). So I knew that there was no way that I could say everything I wanted to say if I waited until yesterday at, say, 11:30am to start writing the first post which hit at noon.

Second, I knew that much of yesterday, I wasn’t even going to be at a computer: I was over at their home, helping them haul away to Goodwill the items that didn’t sell in their garage sale. By the time noon rolled around yesterday, the Arch-a-thon was preloaded through about 10:30pm.

Though not all of the posts were written in the order they appear, the first post I wrote was the first post, the one about who Archie is to me. I wanted him to look it over first to make sure I wasn’t going to embarrass him too much. (I think I did anyway.)

The fact is, these are humble people. There’s not a lot of ego to be found between the two of them, which is one of the things that makes them stand out. Far too many Christians as faithful as they are to God carry on their shoulders a level of arrogance and righteous indignation that is beyond belief.

Archie said in his guest post that he doesn’t judge people who aren’t perfect: the fact that he’s friends with me is proof of that. And that’s one reason why this undertaking has been both important and relatively painless: I believe deeply in Archie and Bekah and what they’re doing. I believe in them.

So it’s now 4:13am, and this post is going to hit the blog for the world to see in 17 minutes. Yep, after staying up last night until I couldn’t type anymore, I went to bed for a few hours then set the clock to get up bright and early and in time to type up a few more posts to fill a few more holes.

I can tell you that the next post will be another edition of my 100 Movies. That’s the next thing I have to write. Then I have a funny story about a former co-worker who actually asked me to put her into a dumpster one morning. That one is already “in the can” and ready to hit at 5:30am.

The two posts after that are not. So since I still have a bit more typing to do, I’ll wrap this one up and move on to #35.

If you’re a regular player of the Saturday Six and Sunday Seven, don’t forget that there’s another edition of the Seven in here somewhere. It’s already written, but I won’t tell you exactly when it will hit!

Thanks again for sticking with me and for reading this far. And if you’d like to donate to them, click the Arch-a-thon tab at the top of the page for instructions.

(And I finished this post with seven minutes to spare!)

This morning, before the Arch-a-thon began, I drove out to Archie and Bekah’s home to help them pack up after a garage sale. I got there as some of the last customers were picking through their belongings to see if there was anything they wanted to turn into their stuff.

It was one of those reality-check moments, seeing people walking away with things my friends have owned. Seeing my friends sell off a lot of their belongings, downsizing to move cross country and into a smaller space. It was one of those little not-so-subtle reminders that time, faster and faster, grows short.

If I was in their situation, I could have a garage sale to end all garage sales. When I moved to Charleston from Richmond, not only did I have to rent a U-haul two sizes larger than the “recommended” size for my apartment, but I then had to rent an additional trailer to hook onto the back of that truck.

In October, I will have been in Charleston for two years. And there are still things I have boxed up that I’ve never opened since the move. Conventional wisdom tells me that whatever is in those boxes are things I truly don’t need, and that I should trash them without even looking at them.

Yeah. Right.

The fact is that I am the son of packrats.  (And here you thought I was hatched!)

My mom and my dad both have a hard time throwing things away. Their parents had the same problem. Their parents’ parents were long gone by the time I was born, so I have no idea how far back this delightful family tradition goes.

I am proud to say that I have given items to Goodwill. I have donated old clothes that I no longer wear and which would otherwise just take up space in my closet. I am also proud to say that I have thrown away lots and lots of stuff.

And I still have more stuff than any one person needs.

One of these days, I will do a better job of getting rid of my extra stuff. One of these days, I’ll find places for all of the stuff I already have.

One of these days, I may even realize that I don’t need any more stuff.

But before all of that, I think I’ll try to find just the right spot for the new stuff I bought today that used to belong to Archie and Bekah.

A couple of weeks ago, Archie and I were hanging out together at a rehearsal for the church band. This particular week, someone else was leading, so he was there more to lend moral support. Archie and I end up having lunch together every two weeks or so, but we hadn’t been able to have lunch on that particular day because he’d had a sudden meeting come up out of the blue.

I don’t know which one of us suggested sneaking out — hey, the band sounded fine! — and grabbing some takeout, but I’ll take the blame because I look the part more than he does. So we went about two blocks up the road to a Phillie-Style Pizza and Cheesesteak restaurant. Archie recommended the Phillie Cheesesteak, and I was hardly going to pass that up. So we ordered, grabbed the food, and headed back.

Archie’s wife, Bekah, I should point out, is studying to be an Occupational Therapist, and she was at home with several of her classmates who were staying over for a few days for the final couple of classes. At some point after Archie and I had eaten, she called him. He admitted, rather sheepishly, I thought, that he’d already eaten. There was a pause. Then he told her what he had eaten. Another pause. Then, winking at me, he told her, “Patrick said it would be good for my heart.”

When he hung up, he told me that her response was this: “According to the room-full of medical professionals, it isn’t.”

The next time I saw her, naturally, I pointed out that I certainly hadn’t told Archie that a Phillie Cheesesteak would be good for his heart. (Good for his soul, maybe, but certainly not good for his heart.)

Somehow, she already knew that. Sorry, Archie! She had you pegged.

Not long ago, I saw a t-shirt that read, “Everything I Know About Friendship I Learned From My Dog.” It’s a funny sentiment, and dogs do have a lot to teach on that subject: they never hold grudges, they’re always happy to see you, and they’re generally happy to just to be near you, even if they aren’t being petted or fed. Just your very presence is enough to make them content.

In my case, most of what I learned about friendship was picked up rather late in the game from my best friend. He and I met back in college, and initially, I think we weren’t that impressed with each other. I think we each saw the other as being somewhat full of himself, which was, admittedly, true. About a year after that first class and less-than-ideal first impression, we found ourselves working together at the same television station. It had been about three or four months, I guess, since we’d seen each other, and suddenly the influence of those first impressions was completely gone.

Oddly enough, we found ourselves hitting it off like we never had before. We’d hang out in the parking lot and — ironically — complain about how much we hated being at that station. (Get that? We were complaining about being there while staying there past the end of our shift to complain!)

For a few years, we were even roommates. I know what you’re thinking: friends should never work together or live together. There’s no better way to wreck a friendship. And here we were, living together and working together. In our case, the friendship thankfully has survived.

I didn’t know nearly as much about friendship as I thought I did at the time. I’d had friends before — at least, people I considered friends — but never really had a friendship that seemed quite as real as Chip’s. A few times, he’d take me up to his folks’ home just south of Charlotte and we’d hang out for a weekend. And from the moment I stepped into their home, I found that I had become one of them. A member of the family.

I’d never experienced something so seemingly alien and wonderful at the same time before. And I’m still grateful to them for that.

Chip is married to Lynne, a woman I love, respect and admire greatly. Sure, there were those moments when they got engaged that I worried that I’d end up losing a friend in the deal. Actually, I wound up gaining a second, wonderful friend in the deal. They are a great match for each other, and delightfully for me, she and I are able to gang up on him at the drop of a hat. Gotta love that. They have three children; I’m the godfather of their first-born son and their second son’s middle name is Patrick. I think you get the idea here.

They live in Florida now, so I only get to see them once or twice a year. I miss them. A lot.

I know I’ve talked somewhere in this blog about being an only child. (I’d find the link for it, but then I’m feeling lazy, and it’s quicker to just tell you here now.)

My parents used to take great delight in asking me, in front of relatives or friends, if I wouldn’t like to have a little brother or sister. They knew I’d give an emphatic “No!” The sad thing was, to me, the prospect of a brother or sister meant sharing the toys.

Yeah, I was an idiot. And as I grew up, particularly by the time I got to high school, I was just beginning to realize how much of an idiot I had been.

So Chip sort of became my adopted brother, just as his parents became my second parents. That must make Lynne my adopted sister-in-law; otherwise, if she were my sister…well…I think there’d be some kind of law against that sort of thing going on. But I digress.

I’ve been fortunate since moving to Charleston to have wound up with another adopted brother in Archie.  Yep, like Chip, Archie’s stuck with me.  If he hadn’t figured that out before, he knows it now.

When I think back to all the close friends I’ve had — wait…scratch that…I haven’t had that many, to be honest — but when I think of the few I have had…Alicia, Troy, Amy, Bill, Carl…it occurs to me that I may have a definition of what a real friend is.

I think it’s that a real friend can fill a void in your heart before you even realize it was there.  That’s what mine have done for me.

And I truly hope it’s what I have done for them.