We've been, for lack of a better word, snowed in for the past two days. Of course there's only three inches of actual snow on the ground and all of you back home are business as usual with three feet and counting, but for here, this is snowed in. In their defense, Texas isn't equipped to deal with the snow and ice (which is the bigger issue), so our normal three minute jaunt to Starbucks took a jolly twenty minutes on roads that make the term 'solid sheet of ice' more real than this girl accustomed to salt-shaken roads knew could be. Our roads back home are so pock-marked with their daily salting that even the ice doesn't scare us. We are brave only because we are stocked with snow tires, snowplows and salt trucks. It makes it easy to talk big.

So snowed in we are. Yes. And so this makes it a perfect time to tell you about why this doesn't bother me in the least: I have amazing roommates.

I don't talk about specific people very much around here, this is my story after all and even though there are so many who are part of it, to draw them out and name them seems a bit too presumptuous of me sometimes. So you'll hear me talking about conversations and happenings, but rarely names. But today, today I want to tell you two names: Season and Jenna.

When a friend of mine told me last spring that she knew a girl I'd love and who reminded her of me, I brushed it off. I nearly love everyone I meet, even the people who are annoyingly like me. But Season? Season. She added me as a friend on facebook and I looked at her profile pics, read the comments we posted on one another's walls, our friendship was so 2010--all virtual, no play. When I met her, though, there was a sneaking suspicion in me that this would be a friend for life--even though I had no idea that we'd be sharing a bathroom, a rent check and life six months later.

But here we are! Sharing life together. We even now share an office--I know, isn't it sick that I always seems to share offices with my favorite people?

I tell Seas as often as I think it that I love her and I'm grateful for her. She has a gift of wisdom that is both unique among our peers and also a gift of boldness that is blessedly masked in gentleness. I listen to her. I can't help it. When I'm spouting ignorance or complaining or confusion, she distills what I say and draws back curtains until we land on truth. I cannot tell you how much I value this. I can't. I could spend the rest of this blog telling you that in a person this is what I value the most. I could tell you that one of my biggest weaknesses is pride and how few people I actually respect and how difficult it is to really win my trust, but you probably already know this about me. Season, though? Season I trust. Want to know why?

She loves Jesus. Simply put. She just loves Jesus.

After Seas and I found the darling little house on Meadow Lane, the one that was in our price range, the one that is a five minute walk to work and a happening downtown, the one that we love so much, we knew we'd need a third roommate. These things are hard to come by, we know. Especially good ones that just fit. One night on the couch at a friends house, though, we found that person. She was tall, fun, sparkly, and she'd just gotten home from Africa.

Jenna doesn't take herself too seriously, this is one of the first things I found out about her. And, at the same time, everything she does, she does seriously. She seriously loves us. She seriously works things out. She seriously dances in our living room. She seriously loves Africa and its children. She seriously weeps in front of us. She seriously works out her salvation with fear and trembling. I love this about Jenna. Love it.

We have so many conversations that are punctuated by her apologies for being seriously too much and every time the words "I'm sorry!" come out of her mouth, all we can say in reply is "Don't!" Because when you know someone who is willing to go to hard, deep places for the sake of the gospel, you are willing to go to those places with them.

Jenna also has better one-liners than anyone I know.

When I'm with these girls, well, I can't even tell you how blessed I am. For the first few months I kept waiting for the goodness to wear off, the strife to set in and the little irksome squabbles to happen. But they haven't. And they won't, I'm convinced.

For a long time I've felt gypped by the reality that I am not in a covenant with the people with whom I share my home. These are things single people must deal with; there are no Death Do Us Part or Sickness and in Health, sign on the dotted line relationships for us. It's the luck of the draw when it comes to with whom we share our homes and visions and lives.

Here, in this home, though, I don't feel that. Ever. I wake nearly every day and go to bed every night with peace and gratefulness.

And epic dance parties in pjs and bathrobes.