My four-year-old daughter just schooled me on a puzzle.

To be honest, I’m not spatially oriented at all and hate puzzles.

That said, she gave me a funny look as she corrected me; putting the odd wooden shape where it really goes.

And people are not pictures.

I observe so many people wanting to cram others’ eccentricities and personalities into even smaller packages than a carefully wrapped Christmas gift.

We want so badly for people to fit a certain mold or image that we forget who they really are and what they’re really capable of.

We want so much for a parent, or a child, or a sibling or a friend to fit into the same-sized shape we’ve already seen made—in our imaginations or at another person’s house down the street or on t.v.—that we don’t see who’s right in front of us and in our lives.

In so many ways my daughter reminds me of my husband.

She’s a constant reminder for me that people are not “man” or “woman,” but individuals who think and move and just are a certain way—their own way.

She handed me this tiny wooden shape—the same one I had just set down in the right corner of her brand-new puzzle—and cocked me a look that wordlessly said, “Mom, you seriously have no idea where the hell this goes?”—as I slid the piece back “into place,” where I had already put it, where it belonged, where my brain had wanted it to go.

But it didn’t go there.

She was right, and I realized this a few beats later as I told her what a good job she had done to know that this puzzle piece went “over there,” in the left-hand corner.

More, she reminded me that I’m not always (or even usually) “right” while other people (especially those I love) are “wrong,” simply because we view the world differently; because our pictures are composed of differing landscapes.

We are not pictures of what other people want us to look like.

Some of us marry, and some don’t.

Some of us have and want kids, and others not so much.

Some of us are religious and others shun religion.

Yet this idea of “the other” is left behind completely when we choose to witness and then accept who is right before us, whether I’m choosing to accept and love myself or my child (or my sister or my friend).

We are all truly unique and not meant to be cut down to fit a certain size and shape, because that’s what trying to cram a person into a prefabricated mold does—it cuts them down.

We cannot recognize and honor who an individual is if we don’t see him or her for who they already are.

And I don’t want to be a vision, but an artist—I want to create my own canvas with my own wild selection of paints.

I don’t want to be a director, but a performer and a willing participant of the audience.

I want to look upon people with gratitude while they look upon me, thinking, “that’s not what I expected, but she’s beautiful nonetheless.”

And I want to admire the people who make up the pieces of my life so that, much like my daughter’s puzzle, the picture winds up beautiful and absolutely incapable of being whole without the rest of its seemingly mismatched parts.

Photo: Flickr/Bodenpuzzleln.

This article was first published by elephant journal.

The post People Aren’t Pictures. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

I used to occasionally hold hands with my best friend in high school in the hallways, walking from class to class.

I remember one time another student asking if we were lesbians, and, quite sincerely, I remember being astonished.

No, we weren’t—yet, actually, we’d already determined through the closeness and ease of our relationship that if wecould be, we would, at times, find this preferential (insert inappropriate teenage jokes).

Another friend, one of the dearest women of my life, has been known to me since she was born—with our mothers friends—and I’m thankful for someone knowing my childhood, my parents and me.

And a friend who means the world to me has been a part of my heart since we rekindled our connection at the gym early one morning before the sun had risen, about 13 years ago. We’ve been through babies being born and then growing into toddlers and children, relationships floundering and, though we aren’t the same religion, we’ve celebrated our mutual holidays and life events together with more joy than you could probably imagine.

And I’m fairly sure I’ve mentioned before that friendship between women is a most valuable and glorious thing.

It is.

Unfortunately, yes, friendships will come and go, but this doesn’t diminish their purpose or their importance.

Because some will, indeed, grow and blossom and flourish while others will wilt and whither—re-growing new friends in different soils—and it’s not always a flaw of either person or a sign of something inherently gone wrong.

Rather, people come into our lives because we’re seeking—consciously or not—their challenge or support.

We desire  comfort and guidance or our own personality needs to learn how to prosper during adversity.

My mother is perhaps my best friend.

She knows me—and she loves me anyways. (Wink, wink.)

Seriously, it’s wonderful to come through a relationship as a child and move into adulthood with the person who held your hand and led you when need be, to now be next to you, holding your hand with nothing but mutual admiration and true knowledge of who you are—who you really are—and love you through and through.

(I hope to also have this with my own daughter some day, but, right now, I’m too busy being her mommy.)

This morning, for example, my mother and my daughter were both at my house—my parents having slept over—and I was getting my tiny lady ready for her day and my mom was helping me do things around the house and one of the things that I did was take that rare, rare time to talk on the phone with a friend.

And we talked for so long that we needed a pee break.

Now…that’s a good conversation.

Because friends, in my experience at least, have been those with whom there isn’t ever enough time.

I was sitting at coffee with one of the closest people to my heart—after just seeing each other the previous afternoon—and we equally commented it’s strange that we still have so much to catch up on.

And then friends are, equally, those with whom no words are necessary or have to be shared, if not needed.

My sister and I can talk—or not talk—for hours.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9jxSOxtYHs

Because I love my friends—each and every one of the women who have walked into my life and heart. (And I also have fondness—and I mean this—for those who have exited—although, gratefully, those are few.)

However, let’s not kid ourselves: friendship takes hard work.

All relationships need nourishment and attention if they are meant to advance.

But real kinship is more than emotional fertilizer and effort—it’s acceptance.

It’s this:

And this:

And it’s not romantic love—it’s more intricate than that.

Because sex and other forms of intimacy can serve to smooth over arguments and irritations and we don’t have that option—or these luxurious solutions—with friends.

But we have love.

So, to all the girls I’ve loved before, thank you for helping me become who I am and for enriching my life (even when it wasn’t easy for us)—and there just isn’t enough time for that phone chat that needs a potty break.

Photo: Author’s own.

This article was first published on elephant journal.

The post To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.