My Weirdness Partner

    This is Marcella Bartausky, my dear weirdness partner.  We dubbed each other "weirdness partners" when we got aquainted in our youth group, and we were the only ones like us.  Marcella's brother, Ty, also dubbed us the "Spastic Duo", a title which we get a kick out of.

    Even though we were 15 when we met, I feel like we've grown up together.  It seems like Mars has been with me through everything.  We laugh now about when we first met, because we thought we wouldn't jive at all!  We each thought the other was stuck up, and "too cool for me".

    Marcella and I have our own code language.  She had started this system with her friend, Pam, and shared it with me when we became close friends.  We soon had our own system going....No one but us knows what Cobbie, Woody, Weedy, Corn, Blech, Drew Barrymore, K-Bear, etc. means. :)

Marcella, Pam
Lacey
May, 1998

    Mars and I had tons of fun when we took on the role of church secretaries!  We met at the office every Friday for a fun-filled day of typing, filing, and copying.  The risograph proved to be our arch enemy, though I think we both remember dear ol' Smurf with a touch of fondness.  We named the risograph copy machine "Smurf", German for "blue devil"--a very fitting name.  ("Blue" is fitting because Marcella smeared ink on the front of it while wrestling with changing the huge ink drum.  "Devil" is fitting because of its disposition.)

    Marcella lives back "home" in Washington, so we had to say a tearful goodbye last year.  :'(  Our last weekend together, I body waved her hair and we spent hours doing a photo shoot.  Then we sat on her front porch steps, waiting for my parents to come pick me up.  They were late, so we spent about an hour just sitting there in silence.  Every once in a while one of us would start sniffing and another tear would fall onto the concrete, then the other would say something funny to try to make things better.  It was *so* hard leaving, and I cried all evening and cried myself to sleep that night  All our plans were wrecked...we were going to have a double wedding, and get together every afternoon while our husbands were at work after our housework was done.  Now we live hundreds of miles apart, and can only exchange pictures and letters.  Unfortunately, we didn't know how to work Ty's camera, so the film from our photo shoot turned out blank when we went to have it developed.  :(  That was our last chance to have pictures taken together.

Marcella has been a precious gift from God to me.  I'll never forget her and no one will ever take her place in my heart.

Update 3/2000: I just returned from a one-week visit to Washington. To view some more of the photos from that trip, click.