Friends and More

These recent pictures are me with my four best friends, also from Glen Ellyn. We've known each other since junior high, when we were 10 and 11 years old. Yikes! We've all seen each other with curled bangs, cuffed and tapered stonewashed jeans, and other bad, bad clothing combinations. I'm happy to say we've aged well. We've made it through junior high, high school cliques and crushes alike, pet obsessions (well, just the one pet obsession, really), prom, college, graduate school, three marriages, and more crazy shit to come, I'm sure. I am lucky to have each of these girls as my best friend, and I know that we are all going to grow old together. As one of us pointed out, we don't even look remotely alike, and we are so different in our own ways, but there are few who know me better than these four individuals. I know particularly for me, they are special because they knew my dad (no one in my current life, aside from my mom and Brian, knew him), and that makes me feel even closer to them. A connection to the past, a reminder of memories that, unbelievably, can be forgotten. What is the nature, or meaning, or purpose of friendship? I think the oldest ones are to be treasured. I know I treasure mine.