When my best friend and I first met, we were in Kindergarten. Funnily enough, we didn't really like each other- AT ALL- until the 5th grade. By the time we were around 10 or 11 years old, we were inseparable. This feels like a long time ago, considering MySpace and personal e-mails were still the biggest methods of communication that there were. Days were really simple then. I'd take a thirty minute walk to her house, or my mother would drive me over, and we'd walk to the convenient store to fill up on Monster energy drinks and other sugary snacks, while we talked about the boys we, for some reason, obsessed over. The private jokes were never ending. Any thought that I had was something I immediately passed over to her. We could even talk in something of a code language in front of people we didn't want to know what we were saying!
Of course, by the time middle school came around, our friendship turned a little tumultuous. We were friends for one year, not friends for another. Off and on like a light switch. As I grew older, I started to become more realistic when it came to friendships, acknowledging that after high school, most friendships don't exactly last, and I accepted that I wouldn't be surprised if that happened with my very best friend.
Fortunately enough, I'm one of the luckiest people ever and it didn't happen with her. After our junior year of high school, our maturity prevented us from engaging in the petty drama and fights we had gotten into before. We now look at the years behind us and laugh at how naive we were for much of the time.
One thing in particular sticks out to me though- life doesn't actually turn out the way you thought it would be. When my best fried and I were in middle school and even before, we'd sit on each other's beds and planned the lives we wanted to have- together. We envisioned glamorous apartments, or otherwise, houses right next door to each other. We thought we'd go straight off to college after high school and be married soon afterward. We thought our children would be best friends. We thought we'd still talk every single day. Like she said to me the other day- "We didn't know how money worked." I'd have to agree with that, and also add that we didn't exactly know how life worked.
Where are we today? Well, she's married and living with her husband in her own home. I'm in college and nowhere near to finding "the man or woman of my dreams" (and gross, anyway). Neither of us are thinking about having kids anytime soon, and certainly, we don't talk all day every day. I guess for only being 20 years old, we're still very young and there are parts of our life that haven't really kicked off yet. I guess there is still time for all of those other things to happen in the long run. But we've still come a long, long, long way away from nick-naming the boys we crushed on in the 5th grade and getting all dressed up for school dances.
Yes, my best friend and I are emerging into adulthood. And no, we don't talk every single day. As a matter of fact, we usually go weeks without talking at all. But those things don't matter because they aren't about what being a best friend is about. You see, when we do talk, it's usually for hours at a time. I can call her at midnight and not be off the phone for hours. We still gossip, because people could always trust me with their secrets- but she was always the exception. We still have stories to tell and private jokes that other people can't relate to. She knows about some of the parts of my life I don't tell others about. You see, friendship doesn't have to end when adulthood begins. And if you've had the kind of friendship we've had, it's kind of a new beginning.
Sheetal Tadiparty
Flickr Creative Commons
