The life of the party : Best Friends from Afar

I wanted to take a moment to highlight and mention an exceedingly random but yet super important person in my life. Many of my close friends and family have never met him, Gus certainly has not, the Menage-A has not, I don't even think Jonny has. But luckily Mumsy, Popsicle and Marcella T. can vouch for his existence. His name is Rob Harbic but I affectionately refer to him as Canadian Roomie Rob.

Now the story of Rob is an odd one. He is a fellow whom I met in Ireland and similar to most of my Ireland adventures he was both unplanned for but very well timed. Mother and I had fantasized prior to my big move that I would meet and fall madly in love with an Irishman named Seamus and we would have a whirlwind courtship, there would be leprechauns and marriage and we would live happily ever after. Now we all know that didn't go down that way at all. Thank goodness because then I would not have made it out here to Murphysboro..... wait. Damn you fake Seamus.

Anyways there were no sexy Irishmen with loads of land in my future but there was one especially amiable, very tall Canadian put in my path to save the day. I had just decided randomly that I was going to move to Galway on a rainy Dublin afternoon because I had come to the conclusion that I needed to be nearer my God to the sea! So I hopped on a bus and moved (the beauty of literally having everything you need in one average sized suitcase). I got off and shockingly it was still raining in both Galway and in my heart. I was ready to get back on the bus, go back to Dublin and fly home that instant.

Now clearly I am taking some dramatic license here but give me a break it was four years ago and I am going to choose to recount this story that way I remember it. I retrieved my suitcase full of my life and dredged down the street to the hostel I would be calling home for the next four days. Four days seems like a random amount of time I know but I was using the last of my funds to afford just those four day. Hostels aren't cheap and I needed to find a job and a place to live asap (it has never really struck me how utterly alone and homeless I really was until now).

Thank goodness or I probably would have been freaking out more than I already was. I got to the hostel and checked in. It was warm and comforting, one of the nicer ones in the area and it was filled with Canadians. Like to the brim. They were everywhere, and they had all come over with the same visa I had. After warming up and trying my best to erase the last traces of sniffles and sorrow I decided to visit the common room to see what there was to see.

While there I struck up a conversation with two Canadian ladies (shocking) who were also looking for flats and jobs and we all scanned the papers together. We wound up hanging out basically all night watching the Shining (random) and getting to know each other. One of the girls who for the life of mes name I cannot remember had a friend named Rob who was also looking for jobs and flats but he was staying at another hostel and was coming over for dinner with us. Anyways long story short I responded to an add in the paper and asked him if he would go out there and look at it with me so that I was not murdered and days later we were roommates, or I should say flatmates.

Now Rob is awesome. He is incredibly laid back and easy to get along with in a hockey loving, outdoorsy Canadian sort of way. He had some odd issues with food and on our first grocery shopping trip as roommates I could not help but mercilessly mock his seeming lack of taste buds. Homeboys diet literally consisted of white bread sandwiches with butter and plain spaghetti with tomato sauce. Sufficed to say he was not a great dinner date. He was comforting though. He made me feel like I had a big brother, someone looking out for me. He had a really upbeat attitude about what he hoped to gain from his time in Ireland too. His dad is a lawyer in Canada and he was going to law school but he did not want to do it right away. He wanted to have some adventures, and flings and just play for awhile and he knew that meant holding down a crummy job and living in a crappy flat but he didn't mind and was actually looking forward to it.

A side note for the story is that I never dated, crushed on or randomly made out with Rob. When I say he was like a big brother I really mean it. So don't go getting any funny business ideas there. After a matter of weeks Rob moved out of our little flat because it was too far away from the heart of Galway and he wanted to be where the action was right in the heart of the Eyre Square. I can't say that I blamed him at all and it was fun having a friend in the city as it were. Now the Canadian girls both moved back home after the Christmas holidays not being able to cope in the new land and then Rob and I were the only ones left. He was currently the social king of Galway and a great uniter of many of us ex-pats, always happy and smiling and encouraging he was my go to when I needed to get out of Belmont and go see a movie, or get a pint or vent about being miserable.

To be quite honest with you I have no idea why he decided to be a friend to me. I secretly think he took me on as his own little charity case. Lost crazy American red-head suffering from a feeling of isolation and the lack of Ranch dressing, I was essentially a walking cry for help. Now my extended family on my mothers side is all Canadian and I grew up visiting all sorts of different provenances, so I had extensively traveled his motherland and could relate to the Tim Horton and Molson references. However, there is ingrained I believe in every American a slight feeling of superiority over our Northern neighbors (or America light as the saying goes), and Jonny and I had grown up mocking the "eh" of our Canadian cousins. He tolerated about two "my country is better than your country" references before he whapped me with his Boston Red Sox hat and walked away.

Like I said, big brothers put you in your place. Rob was a saving grace. When my parents came to visit the Isles I insisted Rob come out to dinner with us because I wanted them to meet my one Galway friend. On Valentines day when I just wanted to get drunk Roomie Rob insisted upon flailing about town with me so I would not be alone (the fact that he was sleeping with not one but two of his roommates at the time might have also spawned his desire to flee his flat). It was there sitting on the Galway Bay with a big bag of fish fry up and a bottle of Dunnes cheapest Merlot that I realized that we might just be friends forever.

I as you all know returned back to the states, thinner, better dressed and happy to be home. Rob decided to keep the travels going and moved to Australia to go to law school. Over the years we have still kept in touch. On random dark winters days I will get a lovely sunny postcard of some exotic destination from Rob and he gets one sent back from me of Williamsburg, or the Outer Banks and my happy places. We send facebook messages and comment on each others pictures.

We don't call each other on the phone and we don't email each other ever.

I have not actually talked to Rob in person for over four years now. But I don't find it strange that I still consider him a close friend. He was there for such an important time in my life when I was working so hard to figure out who I was, and so was he. Remember in my 'how rude' post when I said that it comforts me to know that there are people in the universe who love me and care about me just as I am. He is one of them, he saw me at probably my literal worst and helped me work my way up to leaving Ireland on a somewhat high note.

Before I left for Ireland mom bought me this black velvet purse from Target that looks just like Mary Poppins magic suitcase. It served me well abroad as you could literally fit everything you would need for an overnight trip (and a full stand up lamp) in it. Sometimes I still use the purse and tucked up in the front pocket is a neon green post it note that says " Hi-ya red! It's Canadian Rob interested in a flat together, call me". I have never taken it out of my Ireland purse and I never will because every time I randomly stumble upon that little post it I smile and am immediately transferred back to a little hostel on a cold Irish eve.

The other day I received an invitation in the mail from Rob inviting Gus and I to his wedding. He met an Aussie and fell madly in love abroad and is getting married in February and invited me. Now I have close friends who I talked to everyday for years, who I lived with cried with and loved madly who have not invited me to their weddings. This guy halfway around the world still thinks of me and considers me a friend and someone who he wants to include in his special day and that is just mind blowing. Of course we can't go since neither Herman or I have an extra 4 grand lying around but if we did I would be there is a heartbeat. As it is now we are going to try to make their Canadian reception because I for one want to be there to celebrate the wedding of the person the Universe has deemed my seemingly long-lost but yet miraculously ever present big Canadian brother.

It makes me smile just thinking about how funny and wondrous the seemingly small and insignificant meetings in our lives really are. Ultimately there is no way of telling who will make the biggest impacts on your life, and I for one love the randomness of the heavens choices.