• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Rambling Rach

  • Home
  • About
  • Food and Recipes
  • Lifestyle
  • Reviews
  • Journals, workbooks & more for living your best life!
  • A Few of My Favorite Things

A Sea Bean and the Power of Teenage Friendships

August 2, 2018 By Rambling Rach 2 Comments

This blog contains affiliate links, which means we may earn a small commission from your purchases.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Teenage friendships are intense. I was reminded of this recently when I thought I lost my sea bean.

Yes, my sea bean.

I’m 40 years old, but I was suddenly 17 again and desperately needed that little seed.

You see, it was given to me by a friend when we were in high school.  It has lived in 7 homes with me over the past 23 years.

My friend Gus gave me it to me.  We were in a Kmart parking lot and he found it on the ground.

I don’t know why a sea bean was in a Kmart parking lot ten miles from the ocean.

He presented me with the sea bean with great enthusiasm, as though it was the most thoughtful and extravagant gift of all time.  I said it looked like a hamburger.  He took it back and bit into it.  As if it were a hamburger.  Then gave it back to me.

I’ve been carrying around this weird seed with my friend’s teeth marks in it for more than half of my life.

Gus and I had an intense friendship.  We loved each other in a platonic, but intense way.  He called to tell me goodnight and he loved me every night, even after high school graduation.  We yelled, cried and laughed together.  We held hands and let the other see pieces we kept from the rest of the world.

The power of teenage friendships continues, even decades later.

And then I got married.  And he fell into a pit of addictions.  We stayed close as best we could during our 20s, though it was challenging for so many reasons.  Transitioning the intensity of our friendship into adulthood was difficult.  It was painful.  Our jagged edges used to fit together so well.  But as life changed, they started cutting each other.

Addiction overcame him.  He made some really bad choices, and it all resulted in his life ending at 30.

Wow, I just realized that’s been almost 10 years.

It hit me hard.  The mourning came in waves for a long time.  I still miss him all the time.

Back to the sea bean.

My husband of nearly 20 years and I parted ways in April.  I moved out and left most of my belongings behind while I figured some stuff out.  A month or so later I stopped by the house to collect important things.  My Instant Pot, photos of my daughter, my birth certificate and passport, my sea bean, etc.

But I accidentally left the bean on the counter.  I texted my soon-to-be-ex-husband and asked him to please keep it safe.  I went back to retrieve it a few weeks later and he’d forgotten where he put it.

I stayed calm.  I believed it would turn up.  I left without it.

But I was filled with anxiety and grief.  I cried in my car.  Full on sobbing.

I didn’t like not knowing where it was.

I vented to two friends, one male and one female.  “The sea bean has Gus’s TEETH MARKS.  He’s dead, but I still have his teeth marks.  But now I don’t know where it is.”

Both asked the same question:  “What’s a sea bean?”

It was back in my hands within a few hours.  I kept it within easy reach for days.  I rubbed my finger over the teeth indents.  I felt all the intensity that comes with teenage friendships, just like when he first sunk his teeth into it at 17.

It reminded of two things.  1.  Grief is tricky.  It can wash over you fresh even when you think you’ve processed it.  2.  My daughter is 17 now.  Her friends are her world and I need to be sensitive to that.

So that’s the story of when I had a meltdown in my car because I didn’t know where my sea bean was.

(I told my psychic friend Angela this story and she helped me accept I really do feel Gus’s presence.  This is both comforting and makes me feel a little crazy.  I’ll write about that another time.)

 

The power of teenage friendships

 

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on StumbleUpon (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Lifestyle

Previous Post: « All bodies are ready for summer, so put on that bathing suit!
Next Post: Why you shouldn’t ignore dash lights and always have AAA »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Laura

    August 2, 2018 at 8:50 pm

    I’ve missed hearing your wise and loving thoughts. Glad you found it and looking forward to the psychic story

    Reply
  2. Mary Cardwell

    August 3, 2018 at 9:30 pm

    It is a testament to how much you loved your friend, and that kind of love is very rare. He was a special, very important part of your life and I can tell how much you miss him. I am very sorry for your loss.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe Rating




This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

Welcome!

Are you (or have you ever been) a self described hot mess? Welcome! This is your place. You’re with your people. If you appreciate honesty, unfiltered realness and looking for the humor even in dark times, you’ll be quite comfortable here! Rambling Rach is a lifestyle blog devoted to healing and finding life beyond marriage and motherhood. Read More…

Connect

Recent Comments

  • Rambling Rach on Don Cesar Hotel Review: Reasons to stay Solo
  • Diana on Don Cesar Hotel Review: Reasons to stay Solo
  • Anonymous on What to Do When You Hate Football And Everyone Else Watches

Copyright © 2023 All Rights Reserved · Shrinking Momster Disclosure and Privacy

 

Loading Comments...