“We’ll be Friends Forever, won’t we, Pooh?’ asked Piglet.
‘Even longer,’ Pooh answered.”
~ A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh
One blessing that’s often taken for granted in life is friendship. It’s easy to get caught up in our busy schedules and forget to take time to appreciate the friends who have stayed by our sides from the very beginning.
I met my roommate on the first day of field hockey tryouts the summer before our freshman year of high school. A little timid, Kelly walked up to me and asked, “Are you a freshman, too?” I responded that, yes, I was, and we stuck together for the rest of tryouts – I had no idea that she and I would become as close as we are today. We experienced the highs and lows of high school together: the physical and emotional pain of field hockey conditioning, the excitement of formals and prom, the disappointment of heartbreak, and the bittersweet ending of high school as we each received our diplomas. Graduation was more a beginning than it was an end, as both of us had chosen to attend Penn State and requested each other as roommates. Most people advise against rooming with your best friend, but I couldn’t imagine it any other way. It’s like a sleepover every night.
Friends like Kelly are hard to find but important to keep. They’re honest with you when you don’t want to hear the truth but know you need to. They dance to Lil’ John songs with you in your dorm room while wearing your high school kilt after your first real heartbreak. They wear a matching red morph suit with you so you can scare people in the elevator on Halloween. They have heart-to-hearts with you a couple nights a week before falling asleep. They always have your back, and you always have theirs.