Coxes and Morellos: The First Five Years

 To our dear friends, the Coxes.  The older I get, the more aware I am of the passage of time and how crazy fast it all goes by. Every old wise person you ever talk to will tell you this and here I am, counting myself among them. Good for me.  We moved here to our corner house 9968 in summer of 2015 and I do believe you were the very first people we met. Sean was outside and Nishelle and Dallin, a wee almost-one-year-old, were out walking and you chatted and Sean said "she is nice" and you then invited us to a cheese party which was super nice.  Lilly was not here yet but she was watching us from the heavens demanding to know where her invitation was. 

 I kind of believe every friendship has its first moment of establishment, sort of a "falling into friendship," where you both know this is something special that could go somewhere.  Nishelle and I were sitting on her couch, probably at a book club (thanks Jeanine, who I also met at Nishelle's fancy cheese party) and we were chatting and laughing, and the baby beginnings of a blossoming new palship was taking place. I remember looking at Nishelle and saying, "I can't believe you live across the street." We had recently moved from a big city and were still getting our suburban feet wet. I had made friends in the city but they were always spread out, making gatherings kind of difficult and a bit of a journey.  But this was so easy, she was so warm and welcoming and fun and she lived 30 feet away.  I marveled.  

Luckily our affection extended to the rest of the family members. And in the years since, the friendship grew and included many gatherings, kid-watching, kid-welcoming (HELLO, Lilly!) races, deep chats, vulnerable moments, game-playing, craft-making, race-running/walking/losing ( :( ) , dinner-eating, and food-exchanging.  You have been the best friends and neighbors and such a gift to us in our lives.  We planted a seed of friendship faith in you guys and have watched it turn into the most glorious blessing that we get to partake of often, in so many ways.  And as I grow even older wiser still, this extraordinary luck is not lost on me and I feel it incumbent to pause here in our friendship and say that, no matter where our paths lead or futures hold, what we have now after five years of cultivation is something worth celebrating. A moment of harvest, if you will. Let us reap.

What I've done is gathered every relevant picture I could find, (though I think there are more than I think) as evidence of our friendship. Feeling pretty sentimental by now, I am putting them all into a photo book and since I'm most comfortable with blog books and am 100% lazy, this is the platform I've chosen.  This website makes me laugh because they organize the pictures as they wish and I kind of love putting in their hands. So the book is going to undoubtedly be a little weird and wacky but isn't that the Morello way?  I hope these pictures remind you of all the good times had and serve as a time capsule of treasured friendship and our gratitude to know you and be near, right now.   I dedicate this book to you: Lilly, Dallin, Nishelle, and David. And just know that wherever we are in our respective lives down the road, we'll always be dropping off some random food experiment on your porch, talking about a million different topics in one sitting, and creepily watching you from our corner window--in our hearts, forever.  

LOVE,

Jen, Sean, Julian and cats.

Merry Christmas!
2020