Dear Home Friends,

A lot of people left high school shouting "good riddance!" to their former school as well as everyone in it. But some people held onto their high school gang, and those people are the smart ones.

For me, my high school friends started in middle school, when I moved to a new town for the seventh grade. Even then, I was the "new girl" for at least two years because everyone in my middle school had known each other since kindergarten. Needless to say, this squad has been around for awhile and I could not be more thankful to have them to come home to.

For college, we all went off and did separate things. We went from football captains and club leaders to bankers, musicians, writers and scientists. We have learned so much without each other, and for the most part, have nothing that connects us now. But yet, when college started, we created a Facebook Group Message that still stays strong. We meet up at local bars or houses we used to trash when we were sixteen and be the same friends we always have been. Meanwhile, people I talk to at college say that they only see people from home because they have "nothing better to do" over break. Granted, if I didn’t go out and see my friends I would be doing nothing all day, every day, but the difference is that I get excited to see them. Like a kid in a candy store excited. These are the people that I know understand me, and I can be my full self with them because of everything we’ve been through.

So, here's to the people who loved me through my awkward stage, and stuck around while heavy metal braces fixed my Spongebob-ish gapped teeth. Here's to the people who didn’t make fun of how slow I ran the mile in gym class. Here's to the boy who took me to junior prom, and the one I wish I got to go with to senior prom. Here's to our favorite English teacher and the most hated security guard. Here's to the kids who got suspended for having a food fight (again). Here's to everyone who drove me home from school when we weren’t "allowed" to. Here's to my best girlfriends and the guys I can actually call my friends. Here's to the people I rang in 2016 with and many years before that.

Thank you for literally hanging out with me last night, and most nights the past twelve years. Thank you for shaping me into the person I am today, someone who is loyal and loving because the people in her life have never really left her.