The Greatest Riches I’ve Ever Known

There is a kind of wealth the world doesn’t teach us to name.

It won’t show up on balance sheets or glitter in the sun.

But it roots itself quietly in the soil of our lives —

and when the winds come,

it is what keeps us from being uprooted.

That wealth, for me,

has always been the ones who journey with me.

The ones who have seen me in every season —

laughing barefoot in the sand,

weeping over the ache of old wounds,

wrestling with the weight of dreams too big for my hands —

and still, they stayed.

Not because they had to.

But because they chose to.

Because something in us recognized something in each other —

like remembering a song we hadn’t heard in lifetimes.

We don’t often speak of friendship as sacred.

We write poems for lovers, prayers for children,

but what of the friend who answers when the world has gone silent?

What of the one who sees the parts of you you still hide from yourself,

and loves you not in spite of them — but more deeply because of them?

What of the ones who bring soup to your door

when your heart has forgotten how to eat?

Who know the sound of your laugh when it’s real,

and the silence in your eyes when it’s not?

These are not extras.

These are not side characters in the story.

These are the ones who make the story bearable, beautiful, real.

Some friendships are loud and full of shared adventures.

Others are quiet — a look, a message, a hand held without needing words.

Some are forged in fire.

Some arrive gently, like the sun through the curtains,

warming everything without asking permission.

And some, become mirrors to our own soul.

Reminding us of who we are when we’ve forgotten.

Holding space for our questions,

not needing us to be sure,

but walking beside us while we figure it out.

There is a kind of love that doesn’t ask you to perform.

It meets you in your rawness.

It holds the undone pieces of your becoming

without rushing them into shape.

That love is friendship.

Not the transactional kind.

Not the performative kind.

But the real, marrow-deep, I-have-seen-your-heart-and-I-am-not-going-anywhere kind.

To all of you who have chosen to walk with me —

not because it was easy,

but because it was true —

thank you.

You are the great inheritance of my life.

The ever-growing garden of my heart.

Proof that we were never meant to journey alone.

Ours is a wealth that multiplies in the sharing.

A richness that deepens with time.

A remembering that we belong — not because we earn it,

but because we are.

And as long as we keep choosing each other,

as long as we keep saying yes to walking together,

this life will be more than enough.

Not because of what we gather —

but because of who we become in the gathering.