It happens again.

It’s barely 50 degrees next to my desk window and I’ve sweat through my shirt because I’m afraid of the rejection likely to come.

But Laurie, she falls over laughing at least twice at me.  The good laugh.  The kind of laugh that helps you know that you’re not the only one feeling that way.  The kind of laugh that shows your feeling is universal.

I’m not sure why the fear of being defined as the awkward middle/high school nerd again keeps coming from.  Why do I let that season of growth define me again and again? It’s almost been twenty years since I walked in those shoes and I’m still grieving.  Still letting it define me.

But I’m not that little girl anymore, the one who had rejection on all four sides.  The one who felt so alone.  The Lord, He’s put me in a place where I have people who laugh at my nerd-iness in the good camaraderie way.  Friends who hear the heart within, no matter where they came from, and truly see the person He is causing to come to being within me.

And for those friends and that new image in me, I will thank the Lord again.  Even if I still soak through with sweat in fear of the old rejection.