The remarkable thing about our friendship is simply the fact that we've managed to remain friends. We met in eighth grade, when we were all rerouted from our existing middle schools to the brand new middle school they built in between the two. We met entirely by chance, happening to sit at opposite ends of the same lunch table with our respective friends. Eventually, and inevitably, our two groups merged into one group of friends. The group was bigger then, but you know how people come and go in our lives - somehow, Nick and Ashley have managed to stick around. I'm not even sure that we really had any classes together during that time. It was, essentially, just lunches that we spent together, and the occasional school dance.
After that one year, we split off from each other (again, courtesy of school district attendance areas). Nick and Ashley went off to Lafayette High School, while I went off to Eureka High School. You'd think that would be the end of things...I mean, what random one-year middle school friendships really last?
Apparently, ours does - for the last nine years, since we graduated from WMS, we've managed to keep getting together regularly, even if only twice a year, maintaining and cultivating our friendship into one that I truly cherish in my life. It's really remarkable how every time we get together, we pick up exactly where we left off, laughing and joking with each other like always.
It's funny how we've grown up. Where our conversations used to consist of middle school gossip and judging the attractiveness of Pirates of the Caribbean actors (on my and Ashley's part, Nick just put up with us in annoyance), we spent our dinner conversation tonight talking about our career aspirations and relationships. We also spent a fair amount of time contemplating how strange it was that we were friends - had the new middle school not been built, or had we sat at separate lunch tables, we would never have become friends. Instead of laughing together over a Pei Wei dinner, we'd be at separate tables, maybe noting casually to our dinner partners that we'd gone to middle school with "that girl/guy over there."
That's a weird sort of thing to think about - how people's lives come together and form relationships, and how those relationships would be nonexistent if certain circumstances were changed. How would my life be different if I hadn't moved to Missouri as a baby, or if I hadn't changed schools multiple times, or if I'd gone to a different college or graduate school?
I think of all the relationships I've built with people, and I think about how I've managed to maintain some of them across significant distances, and I'm incredibly thankful for the life that I have had, and for the people that have entered into that life.
But, sometimes, I still wonder about those relationships I'll never have. I wonder if, had my life gone differently, I would have been friends with that stranger across the restaurant.
In any case, sometimes you're lucky enough to happen upon a friendship of small foundations but great persistence. Nick, Ashley, and I have that type of friendship. I have no doubt that, even if our lives go different ways, that we could get back together years from now and still enjoy each others' company. That is a truly special type of friendship.
So here's to middle-school friendships that stand the test of time. Here's to Nick and Ashley. And friends, next time we get together, let's go to Disney World.
No comments:
Post a Comment