Yesterday, we stopped by Karma, the beautiful shop run by our friends, Phuni and Wangchuk Meston. We were there to buy some gifts for a family of friends. Four of their five (wait, now there are seven of them with marriage and birth) birthdays are within this two week period so, for as long as I can remember, we've been attending parties at their house on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. They are so wonderful they deserve their own post but ... this is about Phuni.
Phuni has a great sense of style and exquisite taste - and always looks terrific. Yesterday, she was wearing a beautiful long brown sweater wrap with light cabling, just the kind of piece I've been considering knitting (Vogue Knitting has something akin to it in the current issue). "Phuni, that's so gorgeous," I said. Whereupon she took it off and put it on me. "Take it," she said. "It looks so great on you. Look in the mirror."
We can dispute whether what she said is true but it was one of those moments that causes you to look deep inside. A torrent of quick questions and a mouthful of rejections. Does she really mean it? How can I take it? I can't take it. People don't do things like this. I can't take anything from Phuni - she's younger than me, has had a harder life, blah blah blah blah...and then I just looked in the mirror and realized what she had done. Literally the shirt (well, almost) off her back, given without registration in the great book of "I did this for you" and "you did that for me."
I wore it all day, will again today, and for many days to come.
Thank you, Phuni. Being wrapped in the love of a friend is magnificent.