Nothing lasts forever

Feeling a bit nostalgic lately, thinking about my friends from the past.

"we'll be best friends forever!" - the (ex)best friend

So far in my life, there's only one person I've considered as my best friend. The five or something best friends I had in kindergarten don't count. I called those nicest to me my best friends but it was quite silly since I didn't play with them  much, so I decided to start fresh with zero best friends and "vowed" (as a six-year-old) that I would only have one true best friend, someone that cared about me and played with me a lot.

A few years later I met such a person and she was an incredible best friend. When we were at the same school, she would look out for me. I was quite the crybaby in elementary school, and one time cried horribly when I almost got tripped down a flight of stairs. She yelled at the classmate for making me cry and called him a "garbage bag." I thought it was quite the insult. Whenever I got hurt, she would always be by my side. She left to be home schooled a couple years later, but we wrote letters to one another and played together almost every weekend at her house. I was a sheltered child and learned so much from her. I had my first slumber party at her house, played my first online/computer/board games with her, ate figs from her tree, pedaled a two-person boat with her across a lake, and attended lively Greek festivals with her family. She was caring, intelligent, out going, and fun to be with.

She always said that we would be best friends forever and there were moments when I believed her. Coming from a divorced family background, I didn't believe in "forever." No matter how nice it sounded or how much I wanted it, it was irrational to think friendship could last forever. I was unfortunately right. We spent less time together when she began attending dance lessons and met her first boyfriend there. I eventually lost contact with her. Back then, there was no Facebook and most middle schoolers didn't have cell phones. I bumped into her twice a few years later at the SAT testing sites. The first time was distant and awkward, she briefly said hi and went back to talk to her friends. The second time we were in the same testing room and she pretended not to know me. I desperately wanted to say hi but she disappeared during the break and bolted out the door when testing was over.

I "friended" her on Facebook a few years ago and wished her a happy birthday once on her Wall. I didn't receive a reply. Sometimes I wonder if I did something to cause our distance. I still keep her letters and other mementos.

"you're amazing and i love you and i'm sorry that we've split so much, and its amazing that you cherished everything we were so much" -the once hated friend

A couple weeks or so into fourth grade, we got a new classmate. No one in the class liked her, including me. I didn't like how she didn't pay attention class, she was usually reading or drawing something during lessons. As a model student, it annoyed me greatly. I was nice to her but honestly did not like her one bit.

A couple years later, I found myself befriending her. She and her best friend were always reading manga and I approached them out of curiosity and began borrowing manga from the two. Slowly I began liking my once hated classmate. She was the exact opposite of me. I was an introverted student with straight-A grades, she was lively and still read/drew during class. She cracked my shell bit by bit and I loosened up around her. I once accidentally (and lightly) poked her boob with a fork. We looked at the fork, looked at each other, then back at the fork before laughing our butts off. (It wasn't very funny, just incredibly awkward at the moment.) We'd then reenact the scene a couple more times. We also had super ESP when it came to the guy we both liked. One time we were chatting casually outside the gym before we snapped our heads towards the gym door at the same time. Our crush came through the doors a second later. We looked back at each other in shock and ran away giggling.

We eventually lost touch after going to different high schools. Our personalities are still very different which is why I think we didn't keep in touch. A few years ago I bumped into her at the mall and she was just as I remembered her but prettier. It was a tad awkward but overall great talking to her.

I despised her at first but she later became a very close and dear friend of mine.

"you act too much like a sister I would've wanted." -the brother-like friend

His first impression of me wasn't very good, I think he thought I was pretentious or an overachiever, I forget. I just know it wasn't good. He sat on the other side of the room in Chemistry and Spanish and we didn't know each other that well. We later sat next to one another when the Spanish seating chart changed.

I first started talking to him over AIM by asking what the homework was and for help whenever I didn't understand an assignment. Then I started complaining about school and stress to him. (I'm not sure how he handled my lengthy rants.) I also talked to him in class and there were a few times I caught him looking at my chest. I didn't care at the time and would laugh it off. He was known by friends to be quite the pervert. He had a girlfriend then and she said I was like a little sister to him. It sounded weird to me since I'm an only child, but sure why not.

He made fun of me a lot (calling me a vaca and pinching my muffin tops) but he was there for me. I stayed after school with the Chemistry teacher almost everyday and more often than not he would stay to help me with the material. I am seriously grateful for all his help, I don't know how I would have gotten through the last couple years of high school without him. Although I belonged to a group of girls, I hardly hung out with them and usually ate by myself. He would see me alone and often invited me to eat with him and his girlfriend. I don't think his girlfriend liked me very much, I swear she gave me evil eyes. I tried being nice towards her to reassure her that I absolutely had no plans of stealing her boyfriend. He did give me a fair amount of attention, so I can understand why she wasn't fond of me. When he finally got a phone, I was excited and started talking to him on the phone instead of AIM. I felt terrible when he told me I used up almost all his minutes. I must say our friendship was kind of odd. It was mostly me initiating and dominating the conversations. I didn't know much about him, while he knew so much about me. Then again, I willingly shared everything because I felt comfortable talking to him. When we graduated from high school, I was worried that our friendship would end when we left to different colleges. Thankfully nothing changed as we entered college, we continued talking online, sometimes with a random phone call or two.

Just two years ago, however, our close friendship ended. A lot of crazy things happened in a short amount of time and I got myself a boyfriend. Like my former best friend, I began spending more time with my boyfriend and less time chatting with my friend. (What goes around comes around?) Though I mostly blame myself for not maintaining our friendship, it wasn't completely my fault. It's complicated. Whenever I see him with our old high school friends, I make an effort to say hi and poke his side as he once did to me. He usually ignores me and (I swear) he keeps his distance. Sometimes I instant message him, asking how he's doing, in attempt to strike up a conversation but his clipped responses lead to a dead end. I confronted him a couple times over AIM, asking him how it became like this and telling him that I missed being friends and was crying because of it. It was quite pathetic of me. Nothing's changed, and I've pretty much given up trying to rekindle our friendship.

present day

I've had many good friends the last couple decades but these three from the past are the ones I cherished the most and choke up to whenever I reminisce. I'm just glad that I've met them and have fond memories of them.

Today my boyfriend is my closest friend. I look forward to creating memories with him, my current circle of friends, and the friends I will eventually meet. Not all friendships last forever, so I'll make the best of what time we have together.