On Friends as Family (Part 1 of 2)

(Note: this letter is so long, I split it.  Part 2 tomorrow.)

Dear John,

You might wonder why I've chosen to include friends with the rest of my family. Then again, you might understand, given Uncle August and Aunt Chris, Uncle Jerry and Aunt Joanne, … you get the point. Your family consists of the people you carry in your heart, blood-related or not.

I'm sure you wonder how you're going to know that a friend will be the type you can consider family. The truth is, it differs in every situation, but ultimately, adopted family meets the same requirements as blood family – they love you for who you are, at your best and your worst, and you feel the same about them. It's been said that in a sticky situation, a friend will help you, but a true friend helps you hide the bodies. I'll offer a few examples, and maybe you can see how to figure it out on your own.

Example 1:

The first month or so I was away at college, I didn't know anyone, so I hung out with my roommate, the girls next door, and a couple of other girls down the hall from us. We'd have lunch together, hang out on weekends, that sort of thing; but I never felt like I fit with them. Some of them were rather fond of picking on one of the other girls on our floor; I don't remember what they would say, but I must have found it a bit far-fetched or something – she actually remembers better than I do. In her words, I “decided to see what all the fuss was about”. And so, in October 1994, a friendship was born between me and Molly.

To call Molly brusque was generous. Molly liked to argue, and she was very knowledgeable – a formidable combination. Inexplicably, or perhaps perfectly naturally, I took to her like a duck to water. We talked about everything, learned about everything, did everything together for the rest of the year, with her even moving in during the “Big Room Swap” in March 1995. A lot of people didn't understand why I would want to take her in, given that I could have gotten a single room out of the deal. (I think about 15 people switched rooms; if I hadn't taken her in, it would have stopped about 8 of the moves.) But Molly was the best friend I'd ever had – why would I not want to get to spend MORE time with her?

Sophomore year, we lived together again. Everything started out OK – we were sophomores, and the new girls looked to us for support and experience – something which I think we both enjoyed more than we let on (although we clearly enjoyed it at least a bit). But something spiraled out of control that year ... ok, fine, it was me. I found the Internet, and, well, let's just say things were not cool in our little world. For about 6 months, I saw Molly for an average of about 20 minutes a day – our class schedules didn't overlap very much, and I spent most of my free time glued to a computer, talking to my first “boyfriend”. (More on him later.) When I finally broke up with him after 5 awful months, I took it VERY hard. Probably a lot harder than I needed to, in fact, given the situation that precipitated the breakup. (Girls do that – you've been warned.) I didn't appreciate how she responded to the situation – which was basically that this was all a long time coming, and she wanted her damn friend back already – and I got mad, because I wanted to wallow in my misery and be pitied and have people tell me what an ass my ex was. As it happened, this was room selection time for the coming year; another friend of ours, Amanda, asked me to move in with her for the next year, since I was clearly getting along better with her than I was with Molly (meaning I was getting what I wanted), and I agreed.

I'm pretty sure I broke Molly's heart a little bit by doing that. I admit it was a cold move. There was an awful lot of personal convenience involved in me moving in with Amanda. She and I had almost all of the same classes, so we split books; she was supportive of my horrible Internet addiction, so I didn't have to worry about arguing about it; and I was one of her first friends in the program, too, so I was pleased to have her around. And frankly, I was a little tired of the arguing – you'd think it was a hobby, since that's what Molly and I did most.

So junior year, I didn't get to see very much of Molly. I was lazy and addicted to the Internet, and most of the time, she was all the way across campus in art classes or in her own dorm on the opposite edge of campus from mine. By the end of fall semester, Amanda and I were sick of each other. We only had a couple of classes together spring semester, and she started spending more time with other friends so she didn't have to be around all the time. Toward the end of the year, when room selection time came around again, Amanda announced that she would be rooming with another friend, and I agreed that that was a good idea. Around the same time, Molly and I … I don't remember who called who, because I think we were both thinking the same thing. We met up, and walked around campus for awhile, and decided that we wanted to live together again, and frankly, had probably made a mistake not staying together in the first place. We agreed to limit the arguing as much as possible, and senior year, we got a pretty ridiculously awesome room together.

After graduation, I kind of lost touch with a lot of my college friends. I was pregnant, then in graduate school, then trying to get a job. Molly was training to join the Army, then in the Army, then getting married, then trying to get a job. Yet somehow, every time we reconnected, it would be as though nothing had changed. We could still talk to each other about anything, share anything, do absolutely anything together, and it would be as though the last time we'd seen each other was yesterday.

I missed Molly's wedding. I was in graduate school and could barely afford my apartment plus expenses, let alone plane fare to Texas. It still breaks my heart that I couldn't be there for one of the most important days of her life. So of course, I made up for it by asking her to be my matron of honor – which was her fifth trip down the aisle in that role.

The thing I value most about Molly is that Molly believes in doing what's right. Not what's easiest, not what's the most fun or exciting, but what's best for everyone involved. She's a deeply caring and loving person, and I'm proud to say that she's my friend. She and I have been through an awful lot together, from losing family to getting married. I'm glad that I've had her on my side for all of it – even (and especially) when I couldn't recognize that she was on my side.