He had me at "hello".

Although I don’t remember visiting his blog first, I must have, based on his first ever comment to me.  It’s amusing to me now that post discussed my faith and my kids; out of respect for my Christian readers, he eventually stopped commenting to those type posts, out of concern that those who didn’t "understand" him might be offended.  During my first year or so of blogging publicly, he was one of the sharpest, wittiest and snarkiest commenters in my sphere.  When I followed his comments elsewhere back to his blog, I camped out, fascinated, and read every post he had written til that point–this was before I knew stat counters could track that activity and I looked like a stalker.  Ummm, I guess I WAS a stalker!

A surprising friendship evolved between two very different people, and though we don’t have a lot in common, a regard for each other’s intellect and perspective allowed us to appreciate one another, in spite of our differences.  Underneath a crusty, curmudgeonly and often-time profane exterior, lies a sweet, thoughtful, smart man.  Because he understands "who" I am, it has touched me when he’s asked me to pray for others when he felt they needed it.  I was also much amused when he was disappointed? surprised I didn’t look like Delta Burke; must’ve been my Southern accent :).

I’m thankful to have gotten to know him through blogging, and though we don’t read a lot of each other these days (more so, COMMENT…he’s shamelessly addicted to Plurk now, and though I know I’m missing some entertaining conversation, I just.won’t.go.there!), gmail chat keeps us in touch.  It would’ve been a shame to have missed out on this atypical friendship in my life–there’s only one Willowtree.

Happy_birthday_mural
Happy Birthday, Peter; thanks for making me work to figure out just HOW MUCH OLDER YOU ARE THAN ME (his age is equal to the last two numbers in the year he was born) and I hereby give you my personal award for Favorite Australian Blogger EVAH. 

I do know how you love those awards ;).

 

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