Ain't No Mountain High Enough.

I honestly think I would go insane(r) if I didn't have you.

I know I would go insane. Seriously.

We are lucky. Imagine if you didn't randomly sign up for the  jc summer school class.

I know that was 10 years ago. Crazy... We have 70 more years of being best friends!!

The summer I was nineteen - while still living in my hometown & attending a community college made of brick & covered in ivy -  I had to go to summer school as I had spent my first year out of high school and in possession of a driver's licence basically fucking around and working at the mall. I don't remember the specific class, but I walked in that first day in June and - lo & behold! - sitting in one of the desks was a very familiar face.
A very familiar face indeed, as I had technically known her since 2nd grade & we had gone to most of middle school, all of high school, and even a school trip to Europe together. I literally have memories of her from the playground, from Homecoming Rallies and from Sevilla.
But we had never really been Friends. Members of different however somewhat overlapping cliques in high school - hers was undeniably 'cooler' - we had gone to some of the same high school parties (including, but not limited to, a joint Sweet 16/ Happy 21st Birthday kegger), had had a few awkward exchanges, and a few random trips to the beach.
Cue: Um, why am I having a flashback of me and you and so&so&so&so eating cheesebugers in our bikinis at the beach? Was that a dream? Itwasnot. 
But there she was, tall & blonde & sitting in my community college summer school class - home for the summer and making up credits from her state school. It only made sense to carpool together as it was about an hour each way on a two lane highway through wine country. That summer, couped up together in my little red Subaru while listening to the same mix tape on repeat, we just Clicked, Capital C.

Her: Do you think I should change my foundation color now that I'm not tanning anymore?
Me: Yes.

Me: I don't know why everyone thinks I'm a snob.
Her: Probably because you wear Gucci sunglasses. (It was 2001.)

As the years went by she became the kind of friend that I could talk to about anything and everything. Months could go by without talking to each other- you know how life is - and once we got on the phone with one another, we wouldn't skip a beat. Her heart and mine, her mind and mine are so devastatingly similar in so many ways - and so different at the same time.

But we get it; we get each other.

Me: I feel like a slut.
Her: You're not a slut. Sluts don't exist after the age of 27.

Her: I just ate a jar of almond butter.
Me: It's okay, I ate a whole Hawaiian pizza last night. Out of pure loneliness.

Both of us in the throws of Saturn's Return, we know the silly and the sad for one another - from the simplest of style questions to celebrating our successes (and our falterings); without any filter, without any fear of judgement; we can laugh at ourselves. I know what 'stealing batteries' means and she knows what we'll reflect on when we're grandmothers. I can cry to her; I can send the most cryptic of text messages and she knows exactly what I mean. And vice versa. She holds me accountable in ways that no one else can. There have been times where physical distance & even emotional distance have put pause on our closeness, but when we have needed one another, really needed one another - distance and time haven't mattered. She tells me the truth & I give it right back to her.

If you get back together with him, he's going to ask you to marry him. And I know you will say yes. And if you say yes, you're going to end up divorced in five years.

Especially in this up & down emotional roller coaster that has been my life for the past year - whenever I am feeling like I've gone absolutelyfucking Crazy, that something is missing or about to just totally lose it - I usually find myself thinking,

God, it's been awhile since we spoke...

Mt. San Francisco.
 Location: Saturn.

My Godmother, my mother's best friend of thirty years - the Best Friend that she called 'Sis' - a dynamic, magical woman who knew my dynamic & magical mother inside and out, passed away this year.
I still and probably always will choke up when I think of her not being somewhere in this world; she was to my mother as my Best Friend in San Francisco is to me - My very best friend in the world.

In our lives, I believe the people who love us form a quarry around us, they are the rocks that make up the landscape of our lives - and I know I say it ad naseum - but I am blessed to have many rocks. I am lucky in this life to have amazing friends all around, to have a beautiful quarry, to have and have had many best friends - each one of them brings something amazing & spectacular to my life. The landscape of my world is a beautiful one.

And I know I am blessed to have many Rocks, but she is my Boulder.

Sidenote: If the community college gods are listening, thank you for whatever class it was that you allowed that other girl to enroll a week late in the semester.