grand finale

We married her off. Just days ago.

I really have no deserved right to her heart, but I claimed it years ago. We all did, when we moved into the house on Wayfarer Court together.

Oh. It was a long time ago now.

In our former E-Ranch life, she always played the role of little sister in our group of four. Which could be exasperating, I now know. It was a mistake on our part. But the one good carryover is that we have always looked after her and hurt for her and hoped for her with a certain protective, big sister-ly kind of love.

And we were not about to let our girl - our last precious girl - go to just any man. As it turns out, she has gone to a Very Good Man. When he came along, we had to consider - really dig deep and contemplate - how to let her go. Though she was not really ours to give away - we each had to do that in our own way.

During her wedding weekend, I was struck by how many times it was the four of us together - the three of us tittering and gushing over her and protecting her like Mothers/Sisters. And I remembered that this - what we have - is a very special thing. It is something more than friendship. It is something very deep and hard- wrought. She is our family, and we are hers.

And when she walked down the aisle, looking so very pretty, I did start to cry. In part for joy and relief, and in part because I realized that we were sending her off to a very new life, very far away. And also: this was the last of the E-Ranch weddings. It carried the weight of a season ending. Now, there will be new hopes for all of us, and new questions to be answered. It felt both final and promising. At the very same time.

And I know I will cry again when we watch her round the corner for the last time on her way to Texas, with the car full of the pieces of her life she has collected up to now. I'll hang my last bridesmaid dress in the closet. And plan for the next annual E-Ranch reunion, destination TBD. We'll miss Leslie every moment she is not with us. And we'll love her fiercely from far away.

(Traveling mercies, sweet friend).