A Tremendous Thing

“Why did you do all this for me?” he asked.

 “I don't deserve it. I've never done anything for you.”

 “You have been my friend,” replied Charlotte.

 “That in itself is a tremendous thing.” 

E.B. White, Charlotte's Web

Sunday morning, after a night of texting and nail-biting, I picked up Ben after his sleepover.  He was tired, very tired, but a thrill of excitement at the same time.  As the van door slid shut Ben started buzzing about how much fun he had.

“Mom, we had so much fun!”

I then asked the obvious mom question, “What time did you go to bed?”

“I don’t know.  We had s’mores at midnight … remember I texted you my BG then?”

“Yep I do … did you go to bed after?”

“I don’t remember.”  (That’s Ben code for I want to change the subject.)

“What do you remember?”

“We had so much fun … we played prank wars.”

Hmmm, “What are prank wars?”

“We split up into two teams.  A and I were on one team and M, A, and B were on the other team.  We used trip wires, water balloon bombs and shaving cream pies.  M, A and B setup a trip wire across the bathroom doorway and then when we walked through it a bucket of water balloon bombs were dumped on us.”

Now, this all sounds exciting and fun, but here is what a T1 mom thinks … “ACK, where was the CGM and pump?  Did they get wet?”  But I only thought that, I never had a chance to interrupt Ben’s excited story before he added …

“I felt sorry for A though.  He always walked into the traps first and all the water dumped on him because he was worried about my pump and he didn’t want it to get wet.  He took all the shaving cream pies too … right to his face.  Mom, he was really, really wet.”

“Wow, Ben you’re so lucky … A is a really good friend.”

“You’re right mom … he is.”

Ben continued on telling me every detail of their pranks wars, but I was only half listening.  I was so struck with how sweet A was.  This selfless act, taking on every punch and water balloon to protect a friend, is not what I would expect out of a 5^th grade boy.  I had spent the previous day and night with a heavy heart, worrying about Ben and his diabetes … but now my heart was light.  This is exactly why, we must do all the hard work and help Ben go to sleepovers and spend time with his very sweet friends.  Being a good friend and having a good friend really is a tremendous thing.