For the past 14 years, I have been in a long-term relationship filled with drama, arguments, happiness and laughter. Since I was six years old, I have grown to love this relationship through the good and the bad, the highs and the lows, the craziness and the insanity. I am proud to say the longest relationship I’ll ever have is with the same group of girls I befriended when I was just six years old. If there is anyone in the world who knows me better than my best friends, I have yet to meet them.
It took me a while to realize how lucky I really am when it comes to the friends I have. When I was preparing to leave for my freshman year of college a distant year and a half ago, what surprised me the most was that I did not feel the sadness or nostalgia most people talked about when they discussed their experience leaving their hometown for the first time. On the contrary, I felt relieved. I felt as though it was finally time to let go of the high school drama I had carried around with me, and that it was a good chance to meet new people and experience new things.
But with space and time, the focus on the negative feelings, tense moments and unnecessary drama began to seem less and less important. My time away from home has reminded me that it’s with my friends that I learned Santa Claus wasn’t real. It’s with them that I learned to stop prank-calling 911 because it’s really not that funny after all. With them I drank my first beer, had my first sleepover and went pool-hopping on an unusually cold summer night. They witnessed me during my gap toothed, slicked-back ponytail, awkward phase in elementary school, my Ed Hardy, Greek Festival delinquent stage in middle school, and my crazy, melodramatic, first-serious-boyfriend-phase in high school.
It’s with them that I was able to share things I was holding in that I could barely admit to myself. Together we have made mistakes that we were able to learn from. We have all watched each other change and turn into the people we are today since we were organizing play dates with our moms on the blacktop of Prospect Hill; I couldn’t let them go if I tried. These girls have seen me at my absolute worst and know every aspect of my life, a rare occasion of trust that only years of true friendship can create. Despite everything they know and everything they’ve seen, they have stood by me and constantly reassured me that I have people in this world I can always count on.
Without the presence of these people in my life, my life would not have turned out the way it has. Without them, I would not be the person I am today. Despite the bumps throughout the years, we support each other endlessly. To have people like that in my life has been the greatest influence. When I think back to the warnings most adults gave me about how my “high school friends” and I would lose touch once we got to college, I can’t help but feel bad for them.
To me there is no such thing as high school friends, because my friendship with them will last far beyond those years. Most relationships do come and go throughout your life, but what makes me so lucky is that I found a few girls that are willing to put up with my sh*t forever.
