A long time ago, when I used to make friends by liking the same sport as the girl who played it at recess with me, or wearing the same Aeropostale shirt as a girl on dress down days, new neighbors moved in and someone only a year younger than me and I were destined to be friends. All the surrounding neighbors were older, the neighborhood kids that already resided here were boys, but I was lucky enough to have a built-in best friend 50 feet behind me. I like to think of her as the sister I never had, as cliché and somewhat gushy as that may sound.
Our friendship started out by doing everything imaginable between both of our houses. We would run back and forth for days on end to play barbies, ride bikes, or bake anything we could think of or change it up and clean (yes, we enjoyed cleaning), or watch reality TV shows at my house. We found that we could make pretty much anything enjoyable and that is what I liked most about her. Our summers together came and went and when school came around our merry little friendship dwindled and sometimes suffered because we went to different schools. Some years were better than others if we were free enough to see each other on the weekends, but other years the hustle and bustle of growing up and having obligations caused us to drift apart more than we both expected.
It was in no time that we traded our beloved bikes for our first cars and the “pretend” boyfriends when we played house for real ones.
If I were to put our friendship on one of those best-worst scales that people talk about, then we’ve been at both ends, but with a small amount of time spent leaning toward the worst side. We quickly made changes and brought our highly esteemed and timeless friendship back together.
It was difficult to go to different schools and each grow as people and develop friendships that would last a long time with other people we didn’t know, but that was what made our friendship different. We didn’t need to have school-related things in common because we already had so much without it. We would spend quality time with each other for the first time in days, weeks, months and pick up right where we left off. A value cherished in friendships that have been around forever.
Childhood-instilled best friends are those who can do any small thing with you, and you find their company more important than thinking of petty things to spend your time doing. They see you as a naive child and watch you somehow figure out how transition into adulthood. They know your history and all the details about your life that molded you into who you are today. And most importantly, just like a sibling, their honesty knows no bounds and this type of realness is one that never goes away as years continue to pass us by.
Maybe our friendship was unique in the way that most people have to say a heartfelt goodbye to their childhood best friend as they move away to college, and while I had to do that for the year I was without her at school, this fall will be the first time in however many years we've been out of each other's lives that we won't have to drift apart in the fall. Instead, we're about to share another chapter of our lives together at the same college and that is what makes all the highs and lows of our time as friends worth it. To grow as individuals, to share successes and failures along side her, and enjoy the freedom of being on our own will be the greatest reward of a friendship with the little blonde-headed, KSU-loving girl that moved in behind me over a decade ago.
