Awesome!

The other day while I was Christmas shopping I bought myself a gift. When I got my new job I’d been told about Neil Pasricha and  The Book of Awesome. I’d bought it and read it cover to cover and quite enjoyed it. So while I was in Chapters the other day and say a 30% off sticker on The Book of (Even More) Awesome, I snagged it up.

I was just reading it now and came across the entry titled Getting a hug from someone you didn’t know you were in a hug relationship with  and this instantly made me smile and it was something I could relate to because I experienced that this past month.

Getting a hug from someone you didn’t know you had a hug relationship with reminds you somebody cares about you. Sometimes it’s good to skip the high fives and hand-shakes. Sometimes it’s just good to hug. 

~ Neil Pasricha, The Book of (Even More) Awesome

I smiled to myself and thought this is so true. On November 23rd (yes I remember dates, I’m kind of weird like that), I was having a rough day. I woke up that morning and my cell phone was buzzing. When my cell phone is buzzing it is one of three things, a missed call from a wrong number (this has been happening often), my sister needing something or a message from my best friend.

Knowing that my best friend was going through a difficult time, my heart sank as I opened my messages. It was a message from the night before that I had missed and it was bad news that broke my heart and instantly had me in tears. My best friend means the world to me and when he’s hurt or sad, I’m hurt and sad for him. I would do pretty anything for him, but geography sometimes makes that difficult. We live 2.5 hours apart, so I can’t always be there for him, like he was for me when I was going through a hard time. When I read the text all I wish I could do was give him a huge hug, like the ones he always gave me to brighten my days in a dark year.

I pulled myself together and got ready for a long day. On the drive in to work I ended up in tears again because the song I identify the most with him and all he did for me through my tough time came on the radio. I managed to hold back enough tears so that I didn’t look like a raccoon when I got to work. I made it to work, worked my butt off and  attended an event we were hosting that night for a group I’m a member of. The day provided distractions for me, but my best friend was still in the back of my mind the entire time. I was worried about him, sad for him and my greatest wish was to be able to give him a hug that could give him that brief moment of comfort and relief, but I couldn’t, which made me feel like I needed a hug.

I’m not really a ‘huggy’ person. Hugs were never a huge part of my life growing up or with friends. My best friend of the last 7 years is pretty much the person who brought hugging into my life (non-grandma hugging that is, grandma hugged me a lot). For my third year at Brock, he hugged me every single time he saw me, it was always one of my favourite things about seeing him.

Anyways, that night, at the end of the night, I was talking with a fairly new friend and walked with them to one of the exits of our building. He is someone I met less than 6 months ago. We’ve talked a fair bit and stuck together at events and become friends. Actually in a number of ways he reminds me of my best friend.  As we were saying goodnight and parting ways, he gave me a hug. It was rather unexpected. He was not someone who I realized I was in a hugging relationship with, this had never happened before. It was a pleasant surprise and something that I really needed that day. It caught me by surprise, but in a good way and I really appreciated that unexpected hug.

As Neil Pasricha would say, AWESOME!

In case the unexpected hugger happens to read this, thank you 🙂