I met this couple on my 24th birthday by complete chance. Marriella and Dan (my other favorite couple) wanted to have a chicken fight in the AVA pool. Vanessa was quick to sacrifice her husband to be my bottom half and that was the start of this beautifully wild friendship (Just in case you are wondering Greg and I totally lost. Mariella was not going to take it easy just because it was my birthday). Greg and Vanessa Pope are this awesome tag team. There is no event worth celebrating that goes uncelebrated by them. Halloween (when they met) is always the best. Their costumes always match perfectly. No holiday or kings coming up? That's why we celebrate Sunday! They can always find a reason to be excited. When you are around them, their excitement is infectious. It's being filled with the most overwhelming joy. This one time I couldn't concentrate on my writing at home. At the time Greg was working from home, so he let come over, mooch off the internet, be around someone else whose brain was working just as hard as mine. I think we spoke less than ever that day even though we were ten feet apart. That day I pumped out a short story that was eventually published in my university's anthology. There was another day when I was in this weird funk. I reached out to Greg, hoping he'd be working from home. He wasn't. With a few minutes, Vanessa was at my house. "Get in! We're getting drinks!" That funk disappeared as soon as I got in the car with her. Like I said they are infectious. I think what makes them so amazing is the way they compensate for each other. They have this open and emphatic line of communication. That when one is lacking, the other picks up the slack. They are the living example of how relationships shift. Some days you give 80%, other days you need to take 75%. That's perfectly okay. Not only do they love each other to the moon and back but they love their friends just as vigorously. I have never been the third wheel in their presence. Every time I am with them there is a lesson in Life and in Love. They lead by example and I am forever grateful to have them in my life. It's hard to be patient but I know one of these days I'll find my Pope. Till then I'll be hanging with the OGs. Having such positive influences in my life is so important. They brighten up the worst days (secretly I live for Greg's lame puns, especially when I'm in the ER). I look forward to whatever crazy celebration comes next. That is why I keep living. Because I am loved. Because I love them too much to let them live a life without me.
