Walking With My Friend
by Jackie McCune-Merical
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I had been away - now I was back - back at my grandmother's house.- back to where I had grown up. My mom and I had been through a tough time and I had truly grown up even though I was soon to be just 13. I started the seventh grade at MacDonald elementary and met Marilyn. Marilyn was to become my best friend forever. In those days your social life consisted of taking a walk up town to see who was out and about. Marilyn and I began walking together, sometimes up town, sometimes to her house and sometimes to mine. I made other friends, but Marilyn was the best.
We went through high school together. We went to church together (First Christian Church on Main Street) where we were both baptized when we were 16. We were different in many ways but always best friends. High School was a happy time for me but when we took the walk to receive our diplomas I was sad.
Marilyn married Buck - I married Ron. We began our families. A few years later I moved away but we were always best friends. We called each other and kept in touch. When ever Ron and I would go home to see family we always stayed with Marilyn and Buck because that was where we felt the most at home.
Marilyn continued as a member of the First Christian Church on Main Street and I went on to become one of those crazy Charismatics, but we were still best friends. When we got to a place in our conversations that started to take on a difference of opinion we would just change the subject. I have no memory of ever being at odds with her in any way. She became a teacher and I a minister. We shared many of our experiences with each other and always found joy in sharing our lives.
Then I remember notes and phone calls sharing the sad news that she had cancer. I prayed for her, sometimes through a note, sometimes over the phone and sometimes in person when we were visiting family. She fought a good fight and survived many a battle, but then it seemed her walk was headed toward the other side, as we sometimes put it. Circumstances had made it possible for me to be there with her on the last leg of her journey. I would say that it was the closest we had ever been. We talked about our walk together through the years.
I was reminded of the situation just a couple of years before when my husband Ron passed away. There was a friend, who had been very close to him, that came every day as he was taking his walk to that other side. I thought of what his friend had said. He told Ron that he wanted to walk with him as far as he could. He talked with him about the beauty of what was about to happen and how wonderful it would be when he would see Jesus face to face. They sang hymns and scripture songs and when he couldn't sing any more his friend sang to him.
I told Marilyn about that and we began to talk of our walk with each other and with the Lord back in the days of the First Christian Church. We talked about what the Lord meant to each of us through the years. We were not a Christian and a Charismatic having a discussion, we were best friends sharing the things of the Kingdom of God together. I came every day and stayed a couple of nights so Buck could get some rest. We sang some of the old hymns. We talked of how the Lord was there with us and we knew it. We walked together and I stayed with her as far as I could go. Then, one day after I left, she went on the rest of the way with our best friend of all - Jesus.
It is my prayer that when I take that last walk in this realm someone will walk in victory with me too. I don't believe we should have to leave in the midst of sadness but in the midst of the glory that shall be revealed in us.
Jackie
P. S. I know that the walk Marilyn and I will have in the Kingdom will be much better than the ones on Main Street USA.
Jackie - Marilyn
our graduation pictures
Wellsville High School -
class of 1948
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