carrying capacity

So, this isn't the blog I want to be posting. Last week, I was finally writing one that I had been thinking about for about a month, when my beloved macbook, for the first time since we began our blissful and spotless relationship, FROZE! and restarted itself. Boooo. My blog was gone forever. I'll re-write it soon. But here's a thought I had today...

Earlier this fall, I had a conversation with the lovely Kelly Hamelin that continues to creep into my thoughts regularly. Both of us were feeling overwhelmed by the number of friendships we were attempting to develop, maintain, and enjoy. We were kind of lamenting the fact that humans have such a limited capacity for relationships. Think about how many people you know that you'd love to be able to share every day with. There are just too many stinkin' people, and they are all too fantastic!

So often, I have a brief interaction with someone and walk away thinking that I want to pursue a friendship with them. But I just can't. No one can. We just can't constantly add new besties while maintaining every other relationship. It's like we have a carrying capacity. We're kind of like a plane, or a boat, or...I think I'll be a rollercoaster. We're always adding and losing people, bringing some closer, watching some drift away. There's certainly no solid number, not even close...and things like jobs and school and seasons of life make the carrying capacity fluctuate.

We meet so many delightful and beautiful and broken people, and in the midst of running around trying to love everyone, relationships develop without even trying. This world is so temporary; the only things with eternal possibilities are human beings. Relationships have intense purposes in our lives here on earth, and the idea of being intentional in friendship is something I've really enjoyed learning about over the past year.

I don't really have a big grand final point or conclusion to this post. I just was struck again this week by how many wonderful people I know, and how badly I want to spend time with all of them. And that's all. :)