You may remember some time ago when I mentioned my friend from the gym whose name I didn’t know.  I have been trying to concoct a way to figure out her name without straight-up asking her (because that would be embarrassing!).  You can imagine the excitement in my voice two weeks ago when I called Kevin on my way home from the gym and practically screamed, “I don’t have a nameless friend anymore!!!” He said, “Did you kill her?”  I was so thrilled to have figured out her name.  My trick?: she wanted to see my wedding pictures and I wanted to see hers.  So we exchanged email addresses so that we could send each other pictures.  Worked like a charm.  She found out my name; I found out hers.

A week later, I came home depressed.  My friend (whose name I finally knew after 11 months!) turns out to be a doctor.  An ER physician.

What?!

This caused quite a commotion inside of me because ever since I moved back to Iowa a year and a half ago, I feel like everyone that I’ve been meeting has been married to a doctor or someone equally brilliant. (A bioethics PhD?  What does that even mean?)  I work for doctors, but that’s different.  I could even deal with friends being married to doctors, but suddenly, bam, my completely normal friend turns out to be a doctor herself.  I didn’t know how to deal with it.

Time to bring in the sister.  As usual, she gave me the pep talk and kicked some sense into me.  And I quote, “Titles do not give you value.  Do not buy into that.  Amy was your friend for all this time and you never  felt inferior until you learned her title.  Value your friends for who they are and what they mean to you, not the letters in front or behind their name.”

You know what happened?  I chin-upped and met her tonight at the gym.  And we sweated through class together and it was just as if the titles were completely gone again.

Titles suck.  At the core, we are all just people.  My sister was right; letters in front or behind a name do not give you value.  I’m friends with a doctor.  But most importantly, I’m friends with Amy.