friendship file: K

i'm not going to say the "the jane austen book club" is my favorite movie (because it's not), but i will say that i kind of love it.  aside from the fact that its a movie about lives paralleling fiction, which is always good, there's just some great lines in it.  my favorite has to be prudie's (emily blunt) heartfelt, "high school's never over."  it's just so true in so many cases.

i've been friends with K. over at the artist in the ambulance since i was twelve years old.  we actually first met in the fifth grade when we were both part of this summer program called "explorations," during which kids spent a week in the dorms of what was to become my future high school, and learned more about hawaiian culture.  my first memory of her is when we first arrived and were unloading our suitcases and bags from the bus.  i saw this girl, and she was one of the few people from kauai, but i remember clearly that i thought she was really pretty and had a really cool billabong or quicksilver duffel bag.  the things we remember!

anyhow, while she and i were friends in the seventh and eighth grade (it was pretty hard to be in a dorm with someone and not be friends with them), we generally ran in different crowds.  i hung out with L. and a bunch of other friends, and she hung out with the more sporty, soccer-playing girls and the cute guys.  it wasn't until high school, when groups started splitting and combining, that she and i found ourselves as 2 parts of a new 4-some.  that 4-some has since also split, as high school cliches do, but K. and i have been friends ever since.

i think the moment, the exact moment i knew i'd have her in my life forever came when i was fifteen.  a close family member had been in a really bad accident and was in a coma, and i'd been splitting my time between my dorm on campus and the icu at the hospital downtown.  one weekend, i really wanted to go and see him, so i caught a ride with L., her boyfriend, his friend, and K.  when we arrived at the hospital, K. decided to come with me.  i don't know why, but she did.  as if she knew i'd need her.  when we got to the icu and walked into the room, i realized that his eyes were open.  he'd woken up from his coma, but so much about him wasn't the same anymore.  and even though it was a huge relief to know that he was awake and was going to live, it was devastating to know that his life, my life, our lives, were never going to be the same.  we were in the elevator on our way out when i broke down and cried.  it was the first time i had cried about the whole situation, and it was months in coming.  and K. just stood there and hugged me.  she didn't say anything, because there was nothing to really say.  she was just there.

and she's been there ever since.  for every single hard time i've had, for every up, for every down.  one of her strongest qualities is that she's loyal.  she's honest, possibly to the point of being brutally so sometimes, but she does it because she expects the same in return, because she considers it to be a mark of a true friend.

she expects a lot of her friends, and this is where she has contributed to making me a better person.  i know that i've let her down in the past; there were times when i was too busy dealing with myself and my own issues to keep in touch, there were times when my ups seemed too important to deal with someone else's downs, there were times when i just took her for granted.  and while she may say she doesn't give second chances, it's a lie, because she's given me chance after chance.  thankfully, i think i've finally recognized it and learned.

friendships like these don't come around very often.  i know i'm lucky.  i talk to her more throughout the day over IM than i talk to the girl at the next desk at work.  i've grown because of our friendship.  i'm a better person, a better friend.  i value people more, i give people the benefit of the doubt because she gave me the benefit of the doubt, and i try not to take my friends for granted anymore.

it's true, we grow leaps and bounds after high school.  in the best cases, we shed our childish tendencies and become adults without becoming assholes.  in the worst cases, we remain hung up on the many pitfalls of being a teenager and can never fully recover.  but in some ways, in the most important ways, high school's never really over.

one of those ways is through our friendships.  the ones i had in high school remain some of my best.  my friendship with K. is one of them.