Former Friday ~ Friendship

I wrote this next post on July 10, 2007. I am going to be editing it a bit to remove names since more than 5 people will be reading it.


Friendship & Memories

The word friend has several meanings. The general concept is that a friend is a person that someone else likes and trusts. In elementary school, I thought I was friendless. I thought I could count on one hand the number of friends that I had. But looking back, I had more than I ever realized. There were at least 12 of them. I spent every waking non school moments with my best friends because they were not in my class at school. I remember riding my bike back and forth from my best friend's homes.

I remember spending days running back and forth from my house to my neighbor's home. I could run faster if I ate the green M&M's first. I swore I would marry one guy, but it was another that took me to my first ever boy girl dance. Another fellow and I would hold pretend weddings, but never would have actually married because he had cooties. I had a "wild friend", a sweet friend, a friend that was a little bit of both, a friend that always had a band-aid, and friends that would hang out in our tree house. (yes I actually spent some time outside if you can believe it). One of my very best friends turned into a band geek just like me. My world was turned upside down when I found out I was moving from the little town I cherished. In the last year, I have found many of these friends and it has been quite a blessing to have them in my life again.

I have fond memories of that little town where I grew up. There was the sleepover that I conned my parents into having where all the girls came over to spend the night and all the boys that weren't invited tried to scare us with ghost noises. But I was wise to their plan! I admit to be a little scared to be the first one to go to sleep. I thought I would find my bra frozen first thing in the morning, but my good girl friends chose to not pull any pranks like that on that one night. The other memory I have is of a skating birthday party. Do I remember who all was there? No, but I do have a good guess that most of the girls on the aforementioned list were there. My fondest memory was opening a huge box and finding a smaller box inside of it. Guess what was inside that box? I think there were in total 10 boxes for me to open. I have no idea what the present was. I just remember the journey.

I swore to all my friends that I would not lose touch. I did not want to leave. I couldn't leave. I did not want to lose the best friends ever. I even tried to hide in an attic to stay, but I had to go and I lost in touch with them all right away. It was so sad. Who would I find to race with me across the "huge field?" Who would I find to ride bikes with and play with Barbie Dolls? Who would I find to crush on and who would ever like me for me? I had always lived there. How would I find people that would like and trust me? Who would have guessed that it was time for that Jennifer to grow up?

In 7th grade, I moved. My first day of school totally sucked, but I found my new best friend. It took me a while to realize it, but I would have a core group of friends almost immediately. I can name them on one hand. So back to middle school, Friend E was the first one I met. I dropped my books when I was walking backwards (dumb move huh?) into a mobile classroom. According to her, I had run smack dab into the hottest guy in school. If he was the hottest guy in school, I wanted to go back to home and FAST. This friend introduced me to all the others that would eventually form our little "clique."

In high school, I made many friends. Some were the best friends and some just mere acquaintances, but all were "friends" none-the-less. They all at one point or another had to earn my trust in order to be called a friend. It's during this time that I met my husband. My best "male" friend at the time introduced us. Isn't that crazy? The one guy I had put all my efforts into and the one guy I definitely swore would be mine ... introduced me to my future husband.

When I met him, I thought he was old and a pervert. But as I got to know him, he became my friend. It took from 1994 to 1997 for him to summon up the courage to ask me out. Then it took me 24 hours after that for me to say yes. It took us probably 4 months to realize we we meant to be together, but we did not get married until 2000. We had friends from all walks of life at our wedding. I had friends from elementary school, middle school, high school and from college there on the day of our wedding. I have not seen most of them since, but they came together for the most important day of my life. In September, we'll have been together for 10 years (now it has been 12 years in September). That is amazing. I am so glad that I have spent the last 10 years of my life with this amazing man. He will do anything I want and anything I ask. I could not have picked a better friend to be my husband for the last 7 years. (now it's been 9 years)

Sometime in high school, I met my friend J. Somewhere along the lines we became my best friend. I did not know that it would turn into a friendship that would last this long. I am so glad that it has. He is the kind of friend that I can text to say I've had a horrible day and he'll respond with a a "I'm sorry." There's nothing he could do, but he's still truly sorry that I've had a bad day. And it makes it better (at least a little bit). He's the kind of friend that would drop whatever he's doing to help me out. He's the kind of friend that makes me laugh no matter how badly I feel. AND he's the kind of friend that makes me remember all the good times that I've had to outweigh the bad times. AND he's the kind of friend that calls me after he gets off of work to make sure that I'm okay even though he's had a rough time himself.

You guys might wonder why the long drawn out blog about friends. In the last year, I have learned more about friendship than I ever have in my entire life. It made me think about the friendships I've had in the past and remember the green M&Ms and bicycle rides. Friends are important. They are the most important because Friends are Family. Someone taught me that once.