Kid Talk 101: An Unexpected Conversation About Diversity and Equality

I tutor a young brother a sister in Spanish at a public library. One day, the 7-year-old was teasing me about my boyfriend.

“You have a boyyyyyfriend?” he said. “Do you kissssss him?”

“I’m an adult,” I said. “And my boyfriend and I love each other so yes, we do kiss each other.”

“Ewwww. I’m gonna kiss a boy.”

“Okay,” I said. “But wait until you’re older. You shouldn’t go around school kissing your classmates.”

“Boys can’t kiss boys,” he said.

“Yes they can,” I said. “You can love anyone you want. And when you’re old enough and have someone’s permission, it’s okay to kiss them.”

He wasn’t so pleased with that answer; a little confused, even. Because children are raised that boys kiss girls and girls kiss boys. At what point in their life are they taught that boys also kiss boys and girls also kiss girls?

Kids can be so unpredictable. You never know what they’re going to say, and sometimes their questions and comments put you on the spot with how you are going to respond. I try to prepare myself for the outrageous things kids might say, but I’m not always ready. All I know is that it is important to teach them kindness and acceptance, even if that isn’t the job I was hired for.

This, I think, is why I feel called to be a teacher. More than teaching children the ABCs and how to count, I feel called–compelled even–to teach them how to be kind to each other. To teach them how to use their words to process their feelings, regulate their behavior, and solve problems. To teach them how to be compassionate. To teach them to be activists; to know the difference between right and wrong and to stand up for it, for others.

As a teacher, a parent, or any child caretaker, we need to teach our children–the future generation–more. More than just the definition of prejudice and racism. More than just about the existence of prejudice and racism. We need to show them what we are doing to stop it. We need to gather our children and involve them in the fight for change instead of leaving them on the sidelines watching the world go by.

My town didn’t have a lot of diversity growing up, but my parents took me to the Christian food pantry to help collect and hand out donations. They didn’t stop me from accepting an invitation at 10 years old from my Muslim friend to attend a service at her mosque.

I see now, though, that diversity is a multi-faceted gem, and while there are things we have done to embrace it, there is always so much more we can and must do.

How will you show the future generation you care?

Future Author! “How I Learned to Love Myself”

I am thrilled to share that I am getting published again!

In 2018, I was published in my first book anthology called “Who We Are.” My submission was 395 words. This time around, submission requirements listed the word count at a minimum of 5,000.

And so I’ve spent the month of December eyeing the word count slowly, gradually, growing in the bottom left corner of my computer screen, wondering if—how—I would make it climb to 5,000.

The theme of this upcoming collection of authors is sacrificial love. Submissions could be fiction or non-fiction about sacrifices related to any of the types of love—relationships, friends, family, god.

I chose to write about self-love. Because the journey toward loving myself took me down the single most difficult, most isolating, most meaningful, most important, most sacrificial path I have ever walked along.

I write about embracing my flaws, dissecting my core truths, going months without a mirror, traveling solo, battling my inner and outer demons, processing my traumas, believing in myself, and above all, how through all of these life experiences—the good and the bad—I learned to love myself.

I can’t wait for you all to check it out come February 2020. As it turned out, a minimum 5,000 word count was exactly what I needed to make my piece imperfectly perfect.

22 Things I’ve Learned Through Dating & Dumping

1. Honesty is the greatest attribute in a significant other, down to one’s selfless ability to tell the truth even if it means they are the one that causes pain.

2. Trust between two people should be earned, and trust between two people should be respected. Unfortunately, should be is not the same as will be.

3. Beware of taking things for granted. Gratitude never gets old, no matter how long you’ve been together.

4. You can be friends with some exes. You won’t likely be friends with all your exes.

5. There will be times you put your faith in someone and they let you down. If they let you down in the form of cheating, get out.

6. If you and your partner aren’t communicating, work on fixing it or else your relationship is doomed.

7. If he keeps you a secret from everyone else, run for the hills.

8. Learn each other’s love language.

9. Do not lose yourself in a relationship and don’t be anyone but yourself in a relationship.

10. If two people aren’t in the same place feeling-wise, the one who wants less always wins.

11. You have to get past the honeymoon phase before you’ll know if you two are really compatible.

12. Both people have to compromise in order for the relationship to flourish.

13. When you’re in a relationship with someone else, you’re still in a relationship with yourself. Don’t neglect that. Alone time is vital.

14. Sometimes a person will awaken your love without the intention of fully loving you. Sometimes that’s cowardice, sometimes that’s cruel, and sometimes that’s just life.

15. If he says he wants to focus on his career or isn’t ready for a relationship now, he’s really just not that into you. Find someone who would, if it came down to it, tell you if he’s just not that into you.

16. You can’t force someone to love you back.

17. There will be people you take a chance on, and there will be people who you know you can’t take a chance on. Not everyone deserves a chance; sometimes you’ll give chances that shouldn’t have been given. And that’s okay.

18. Dating is about learning what you want and need in a relationship. Your wants and needs might change, and so might theirs. What you can give might change, or it might not.

19. You deserve to be with someone who lifts you up, not someone who pulls you down.

20. Sometimes you’ll grow together. Sometimes you’ll grow apart.

21. You never know how many firsts you’ll have before you have your last firsts.

22. Never, ever, ever, ever settle.

Hurricanes, Hugs & Humor

The first two weeks of October, I was on the road A LOT, offering my heart and receiving so much heart in return.

When Hurricane Irma hit the Keys, I struggled from afar for half a dozen reasons, part of which involved immense empathy and understanding for my Keys island family, having lived through a CAT 4 storm myself.

As the days ticked by, I found myself becoming increasingly more anxious to step foot in my old stomping grounds. I was antsy out of excitement, nerves, and fear.

Without consciously planning it this way, the timing of my trip proved to be quite serendipitous. I boarded a red eye on September 30, the two-year anniversary of the day a tropical storm was brewing in the Caribbean that might hit the remote Bahamian island I was living on. I landed on October 1, two years to the day I woke up to a CAT 4 historic hurricane on top of me.

But the second I walked out of Miami International Airport and into the arms of my Bahamian island parents who drove from Naples just to see me, my anxiety melted away. My island parents hug like no other–strong, sturdy, genuine. Their embrace needs no words to tell how they feel about you, about life, because their assuring physical touch says it all.

They drove me down to Florida City after a quick jaunt at Cracker Barrel (a restaurant I haven’t seen or visited in years–Amurrica!). I then waited excitedly in a Starbucks to reunite with my friend Kris who left the Keys nearly five years ago. I was SO excited that, in sending a flurry of texts and phone calls sharing my whereabouts and ETA to Keys folk, my palpable joy started putting smiles on faces of the coffee shop’s caffeine-infused customers.

I expected to hold back tears as we entered Key Largo, creeping south toward Marathon in the Middle Keys. Memorable and iconic local hot spots were strewn about; towering piles of debris lined the roads. But mostly, I had a smile on my face, because I knew I was about to see my island family.

In the short week that I spent in the Keys, I had limited time to help: ripping off moldy, sodden baseboards, tearing down dry wall, and digging through sand. My friends are exhausted; cleaning up the aftermath of a hurricane is a daunting task. Many of my friends are now homeless and/or jobless.

But they still have so much love to give.

I spent the evenings attempting to organize gatherings–relief from the hurricane relief. I knew one week wasn’t much time for me to make a dent in the clean-up and construction, but aside from putting my set-building skills to use, I also have my joy, love, and comedy to offer.

Before my trip to the Keys, I was struggling to process it all. I called one of my closest friends who knows the long version of what I’ve been dealing with the past couple years. He asked me to recall the first time I laughed after Hurricane Joaquin.

I really, really had to think about that. Due to my isolated situation following the storm, it was two weeks before I could get out into the community. I had no one to talk to about the fear I’d experienced or the apocalyptic aftermath that kept me awake and inappetent. Two isolated weeks following a traumatic experience is like two years.

But I thought hard, and then I started laughing. I remembered someone lending me some gasoline so I could drive the truck down south and make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to distribute to the now homeless, alongside the hot dogs my friends cooked. (Read more about the incredible perspective I gained from this trip south here.)

Bahamians like their meat, and they don’t eat PBJs. (It’s largely an American thing.) I made somewhere between 50 to 100 PBJs… but I had to practically beg the locals to take the sandwiches from me once we ran out of hot dogs. I remember laughing at my efforts to help and seeing how people can still be opinionated in the hardest of times. It reminded me that no matter what life throws at us, we’re still human.

Even if I am covered in sweat and dirt and my muscles are sore, I am still me. Even if my heart is broken and I can’t imagine tomorrow, I am still me. I will always have the gift of crazy, uninhibited, Energizer-Bunny energy, and I tried my hardest to share that with my island family then and now.

Another aspect of my healing process that was missing post-Joaquin was human contact. Studies show that supportive physical touch–a simple hug–actually results in incredible physiological changes within the body, including decreasing stress.

I hugged often and I hugged hard when I was in the Keys, because I’m a hugger, and I know how much I’ve missed and needed that in my life. My Keys friends are huggers, too, and they have a way of making me feel more loved than I’ve ever felt before.

Mother Nature can turn lives upside down in an instant, but she cannot destroy our human nature, that indelible mortal connection. Laughter and physical touch bring joy and hope that have a healing power all their own.

The Keys will recover just like Long Island, Bahamas recovered, and it happens with love, joy, and a little bit of laughter.

To anyone experiencing hardship: hug & laugh, more & often.

The Art of Listening: Stop Telling, Start Hearing, Give Feeling

My best friend knows me about as well as I know myself, and he is the one person in the world that I have told everything to. Part of the beauty of our friendship is that I don’t feel that I have to tell him everything but I know that I can and want to tell him everything.

He is my confidante, advisor, soulmate, comedian, and one hell of a listener.

Recently, I asked him to just listen, to offer no advice or opinions because even though I respect and value whatever he has to say, and I know it always comes out of love and care for me, and I know he is always right (dang nabbit)… At that moment, I just needed someone to hear how I was feeling. I needed empathy, not pragmatics.

And I am tired of people telling me how to feel.

Do you know how hard it is to shut your mouth and just listen? Humans have a natural instinct to try to fix things, even if it isn’t their own thing to fix. Vulnerability makes so many people uncomfortable that when they see someone else opening up their bag of emotions, they instinctively reach to clasp it shut.

No one wants to pick up the pieces of brokenness, so humans work to make things right and whole again. We hurt to see others hurting, but we’re also scared shitless of it. I know. I’ve been there.

My best friend listened to me, my big mouth, and my bigger heart for an hour. He didn’t set the phone down away from him; I could hear him breathing. He said about two sentences, neither of which was advice. One was a short but welcome opinion. The other was a deep sigh followed with two of the most common words in the English language, a phrase that we dole out like chocolate in a candy store, words that are simultaneously overused and underused because often times we’re too self-righteous, egotistical, or bull-headed to use them.

He told me, “I’m sorry.”

He wasn’t pitying me and he wasn’t trying to fix me. He wasn’t telling me that I would be okay, that it would get better–things I already knew to be true. He was just feeling my feelings, embracing my vulnerability. That simple act, listening and empathizing, acknowledged the courage it took for me to slice open my chest and lay my beating heart on the table.

Sometimes, when I bare myself in this way, the flutter of ensuing commentary is like a meat pounder, and my heart is its victim. Sometimes, those remarks are what I need to hear. Usually, they’re what I should hear.

But sometimes, I already feel so hurt and alone that bringing out the meat pounder only grinds me to a pulp. Words are so very powerful. Sometimes, too many of them can be so overbearing that their target looms smaller.

While speech has a time and place and always a freedom and right, sometimes listening is the greatest act of love we can offer someone who is in pain.

I asked my friend if he was dying to give me advice. He told me no. He said one day, when I’m ready, I’ll hear it. But that wasn’t today. Today he was just sorry.

How to Change the World in 4 Easy Steps

We all want our lives to have meaning. We all want our time on this earth to be significant. We all want to make a difference in the world.

But how, exactly, do we do that?

It’s something I struggled with greatly when I took a break from wildlife conservation to work in a more stable veterinary clinic setting. It’s something that tormented me as I set off to chase my many dreams. Was I being selfish? How was I giving back to the world?

I have since realized four things:

First, every job is giving back in some way. Maybe you’re helping the needy, maybe you’re inspiring others, maybe you’re boosting the economy, maybe you’re putting a smile on someone’s face or simply making their day a little easier.

Second, my career does not define me. My values, beliefs, morals and desires define me.

Third, by focusing on myself, I have been able to gain incredible self-awareness. I know my wants and needs. I know my skills and talents. And I can nurture them and use them to change the world.

Fourth, changing the world does not happen on a monumental scale. Change in the world is the result of chain effects. Little things. Elementary, my dear Watson.

So how do you change the world?

 1. Know yourself

Self awareness goes a long way toward making the world a better place. Take time to actively engage in conversation with yourself, to get to know you. Spend quality alone time with no one other than yourself and learn to enjoy it, to crave it. Slow down. Pray, meditate, journal or find an active means of self reflection to guide you along the path to self discovery.

 2. Love yourself

Appreciating your own self worth is pivotal to anyone’s success and happiness. People who want to change the world want to do so because they love humanity, they love this earth. But we absolutely cannot fully love anything else without wholly embracing who we are as individuals. If love really does make the world go round, then it starts within ourselves.

3. Be yourself

In a world full of so much sham, authenticity is a rare find. Live your life with honesty and integrity. Never try to be anyone but yourself. If we are not truthful to ourselves, then we are not being truthful to the changes we wish to see in the world.

 4. Give of yourself

Pay it forward. The focus on giving back isn’t on being selfless, because learning to love yourself can be an incredibly selfish task, one that requires constant time and sacrifice. Give of yourself by being open and vulnerable to the world so that you can find your role in it.

And that’s it. It really is that simple.

How do you change the world? By turning the focus inward. Look to yourself and there you’ll find the answer.

The Stranger on a Plane Who Saw My Broken Heart

I held the pink, laminated reusable boarding pass in my hand, rubbing my finger over its bubbled edges. The weight shifted in my backpack as I re-situated it on my shoulders and picked up my laptop case. I handed my paper ticket to a woman behind the metal fence and walked along the concrete to the plane’s steps.

No security checkpoint and no overhead storage bins awaited me. My ears would not be alerted by an announcement that the plane was about to lift off. I could reach into the cockpit and touch the pilot. I could hold hands with nearly everyone on the plane without having to leave my seat.

Though it felt like the 1940s, it was 2015, and I was leaving the place I’d learned to call home.

I was saying goodbye to an island whose people, simplicity, and natural beauty I’d come to love.

And yet, at that moment, I wanted to be away from people, floating on a cloud among the birds of the sky. I wanted to be free but have all the answers, I wanted to feel loved and worthy and adored, and I wanted the fissure in my heart to be miraculously healed.

As the plane took flight, I leaned against the thick, sweating window glass, trying to become invisible. I didn’t want to look outside because that meant accepting the daunting truth that those turquoise blue waters I’d come to know would no longer be present in my daily life. I didn’t want to look down because then I’d see that I was moving away from those white sand beaches of quiet isolation, not toward them.

I didn’t want to look out the window because then I might see my reflection, and that would feel like staring into the face of someone I didn’t know.

Instead, I closed my eyes tight and hugged my backpack to my chest, trying to shield my face from the other passengers on this 14-seater plane, trying to hide my pain. But the tears falling down my cheeks coupled with my silent sobs gave me away to the man sitting across the two-foot aisle from me.

Wordlessly, he removed a tissue from his bag. I was burying my brokenness into the nylon cover of my travel backpack when he tapped me on the shoulder. I raised my head a couple inches to see the tissue dangling by my cheek.

The stranger on the plane smiled at me.

Without saying anything, I took the tissue and wiped my eyes and runny nose. I crumpled it into a ball for later use and then made eye contact with the man. My lips turned up ever so slightly, a genuine smile but one that took effort nonetheless.

The stranger on the plane nodded his head and turned to look forward, giving me privacy to process my feelings.

His kindness reminded me that I am not and should not feel alone in this world, and that I am also allowed to have my feelings–no questions asked.

I didn’t know that the next two years of my life would be the hardest two years of my 29 years. I didn’t know that they would also be the most rewarding.

I didn’t fully understand all that I was leaving behind, that it was a testament of self-love to jump headfirst into this new unknown–lost, scared, confused, sad, lonely, depressed, anxious, and in that moment, so very broken-hearted.

I didn’t fully grasp that taking this first step on the next part of my journey would, in time, prove to be one of the most valuable and meaningful chapters of my life.

It took me two years to recognize that abandoning the island life to chase opportunities in the city was one of the most courageous things I have ever done. Two years and I realized that leaving that island home–one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done–was also one of the most loving things I could ever do for myself.

I am not, I was not fearless. But I did stare fear in the face while navigating an increasingly rocky path to become the incredibly self-aware woman I am today.

If you asked me if I’d do it all over again, I don’t know that I’d say yes. But if you asked me if the loneliness, heartache, and utter confusion were worth it, I’d look you in the eyes and tell you that believing in myself and knowing who I am and what I want in life is my biggest achievement, and I have those feelings to thank for that.

On Unrequited Love: The Art of Break-Ups From the Mouth of a Dumpee

When I commit–to anything–I give it my everything. I will nurture a relationship even as it is being dragged under, spluttering, drowning. I will throw it a life raft time and again, resuscitating it even when I can feel, deep down, that the river is going to win.

When I fall, I fall hard. My heart is an urn, filling with memories. And when it’s knocked down, each beat shatters the ceramic further, fissures growing into chasms until my storage of recollections explodes painfully before me.

I consider myself a strong, confident and independent woman. And while I’m proud to maintain my independence in a relationship, I still crumble in love. But when you give of yourself entirely to something, someone…how can you not?

I am two for three when it comes to unrequited love. I have an excellent track record of being the one who gets dumped in a relationship. And it has been over a decade since a man told me he loved me.

For so long, this had me questioning: Am I unlovable?

One of my first relationships saw an incredibly painful break-up. A few months after we started dating, I told him I loved him. But, notorious for my bad timing, I sobbed it to him to clarify a misunderstanding–that misunderstanding being why I was acting so weird.

I shouted, truthfully: “It’s because I’m in love with you!”

I wasn’t even in love with me at that moment, but I didn’t anticipate having to spend the next year holding back my feelings.

In whispers, I repeated my profession of love to him only three more times in our relationship. “You know I love you, right?” I once said. “I know,” he responded.

He knew.

And I knew.

You can’t force love.

And you can’t wait forever.

When I called him over one evening to talk, seeing our relationship disintegrate before my eyes, fearing its demise, the night ended with me punching my concrete wall repeatedly. I wanted to break something to counter my breaking heart. But the wall wouldn’t break.

We were both crying, but he was the only one who could see any practicality at that point, that our tears were only sucking us dry. He said I was amazing and beautiful, but we were just too different.

“Tell me it will be okay,” I pleaded.

And he did. He grabbed my shoulders and told me I would get through this, that I would be okay. And then he stood to leave.

But it was past midnight. I wasn’t ready to be alone with myself in a cramped apartment with a wall that wouldn’t break. I wasn’t ready to be alone with the memories of us and the hurt of that night that overshadowed any promise of tomorrow. So I ran.

I sprinted barefoot in forty degree weather down the street in my sketchy neighborhood. I ran from my pain and the puddles of my tears. I ran from the truth and I ran from him.

But he followed me. Goddammit, he wouldn’t let me run.

He walked me back to my apartment and made me promise to stay inside. And because I could see I was hurting him, I promised. I don’t break my promises.

I am an emotional, sensitive and empathetic person, but my pain blinded me to his.

I fight endlessly for my relationships because I believe so strongly in change, compromise, communication and second chances. But I’ve realized another reason I hang on so tightly.

I know heartbreak. I have felt it so deeply that it creates a hole in my chest. It has consumed me so much that I forget to take care of myself. Break-ups are a part of life. And though I always come out stronger, I would never wish heartache upon anyone.

Because of this, I would rather have my heart broken than break someone else’s.

But pain can make us selfish. Yes, the experience of heartbreak is unique for everyone but it is not unique to everyone.

I assumed that when I closed my door and he got in his car for the long drive home, his tears had stopped coming. I assumed that while I was wailing, he was watching the stars through his window, relieved. I assumed that when I dialed my friend to tell her I needed her, he was thinking of what time he had to get up in the morning for work.

Because he never loved me. So how could he be hurting just the same?

While I never fully knew the journey he went through to heal, or how long it took him to get over me, I do know his tears didn’t stop just then.

We didn’t talk much after that night. I try to be friends with my exes; it doesn’t always work out. But he did send a message a few days later to make sure I was okay, in the same breath admitting that he was still crying.

He’ll never know how that one message helped me, not just then, but in future relationships. I’ve never understood why a man doesn’t see that I’m worth fighting for, but at least I know that I am not unlovable. He didn’t love me in the same way I loved him, but he sure as hell cared about me.

Wherever he is, I hope he has found someone worth fighting for.

And one day, I’ll find someone who wants to fight for me.

**Please Note: Some changes have been made in courtesy of anonymity.

I Like My Men Emotional

My dad was the first man I ever saw cry. The second was my grandpa.

I was in fourth grade when the priest at our church passed away. That was the first time I experienced death, and the first time I saw tears slip down my father’s cheeks. In future years, I would see him cry at funerals, when we buried our guinea pigs in the backyard, and when we held our dog as he slipped over the Rainbow Bridge. Later, I would see him cry out of pride–when he walked my sister down the aisle on her wedding day, when he told his three daughters how proud he was of our independence.

I was in eighth grade when I saw my grandpa cry for the first and only time in my life. My grandma had just passed away. Grandpa and I were standing on his porch, looking out at the street. We were both quiet, processing the hard truth of saying goodbye. Then out of nowhere he started bawling.

At thirteen years old, I was somewhat taken aback. Women, I was used to seeing cry like this. But what do you do when you are the sole witness to the painful tears of someone who society paints as a pillar of protection and strength? What do you do when you’re young and naive and still not quite sure about this thing they call life?

My grandpa opened up to me in that moment more than he would ever open up to me in the sixteen years that I knew him. “I don’t know what to do,” he told me. “I just loved her so much.”

With those two sentences, he unlocked the door to his heart, sharing with me his deepest fear. He made himself vulnerable. And it made me love him more than I thought I could.

A girl standing next to a grown man sobbing, I didn’t know if there was a right or wrong thing to do, so I just hugged him and cried, too.

We live in a world of stereotypes. Men are supposed to be stoic; women are supposed to be emotional. Men are the strong ones; women are the weak ones.

At least that’s what we’ve always been told.

But females are paving a way for ourselves. We are shattering glass ceilings, we are dissolving stereotypes, we are striving for equality. And many men are right there with us in solidarity. Yet much of our fighting is to have the same rights as men.

What about the men in the world? Who is fighting for them to have the same rights as women?

I like my men emotional.

It has taken me 28 years to truly accept that my emotions are not a curse. Twenty-eight years, and I, a woman, finally see that emotions take off my blinders to the world, that they give me empathy and compassion.

When I am sitting on my friend’s couch sobbing because my heart is broken into a thousand pieces, when I am screaming into my best friend’s pillow because I can’t process today let alone tomorrow, when I am a blubbery mess relaying my insecurities over a phone line, when I am blotchy and tear-stained and at my absolute ugliest… I am at my most vulnerable.

Allowing myself to be this way, to ask for help and let others see me in pain, is one of the strongest things I will ever do.

And when a man cries on my shoulder, be it out of joy or anguish, whether friend, family or partner, he is, in that moment, the most beautiful man I know. He is honest, unadulterated and incredibly human. He carries the strength of a hundred men.

I have listened to the sobs of my friend’s brother as he eulogized his father. I have mingled my tears with my best friend’s as we held each other and processed a suicide. I have watched a man swipe a finger under his eye as he married the woman of his dreams, and then later when he held their child in his arms. I have seen tears glisten in the sun as men relayed their survival stories following Hurricane Joaquin. I have shaken strangers’ hands after they told me that my performance on-stage made them well up. I have hugged crying men as I packed up my bags and moved on to my next adventure and others who have cried upon my surprise return. I have heard the wails of dozens of males as they watched their beloved pet take one last breath. I have held an ex’s hand with one of my own and collected his tears with my other as he cried and broke my heart.

And I know that if these are the faces of the next generation of patriarchs, then the future is bright.

Sisters in 100 Words

best friends, soulmates, confidantes, supporters, dreamers, pranksters, defenders, time travelers, counselors, partners-in-crime, rationalizers, unconditionalists, problem solvers, truth-tellers, encouragers, memory-makers, idols, advisors, caretakers, believers, talkers, menders, comforters, risk-takers, co-conspirators, teachers, stress relievers, competitors, opportunists, free thinkers, listeners, comrades, borrowers, motivators, shrinks, impressionists, compromisers, helpers, teasers, guardians, teammates, shoulders, cooperators, promise-keepers, trustees, influencers, celebrators, sympathizers, opinionists, self-esteem boosters, co-workers, darers, leaders, mimickers, resources, praisers, contributors, lenders, safe havens, inspirers, expressionists, sneaksters, resolvers, appreciators, witnesses, sharers, moralists, confidence builders, energizers, tolerators, kindred spirits, role models, loyalists, ministers, secret keepers, committers, beauties, comedians, virtuists, mirrors, commonalities, forgivers, heroes, jokesters, pragmatists, identities, protectors, givers, companions, admirers, bequeathers, equals, sidekicks, examples, playmates, connections, humblers, other half, family, everything.