Alana and I became attached at the hip in early high school. We developed the rare kind of friendship where we could spend day after day together and still find things to talk about, we laughed constantly, and we never fought. (She's also a total snuggle monster like I am, so I could always count on her for some comfort-cuddles when I was upset. Bonus!) She was my partner in crime and the one person I could tell anything to without fear of judgment. When it turned out we'd be going to college very far away from each other -- me to Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee, and her to Northeastern here in Boston -- it instilled far more panic in me than the thought of being separated from my parents.
We committed to making the most of our last summer together. We kicked it off with a seven-day Caribbean cruise -- along with, and thanks to, my grandparents. The old folks' only rule was that we show up for dinner -- which we did, save the day we got so drunk on the beach that we were puking by mid-afternoon. (I desperately wish I could post some of those photos, but sadly, I don't have a scanner.) We took full advantage of the international waters, stayed up late hanging with a family from California, and generally acted like the hyperactive, flirtatious, over-intoxicated 18-year-olds we were. On our way home, when our flight was overbooked, we traded our seats for a later flight and vouchers from the airline. We used the vouchers at the end of the summer for our final pre-college adventure: a trip to L.A. to visit the family from the cruise, at the end of which we went to Venice Beach and got matching tattoos near our right hipbones.
Christmas of our freshman year of college (2003), at the annual "girls' night."
We both struggled a lot, for very different reasons, our freshman year of college. I had made a stunningly bad choice with school -- though the academics were fantastic, it fell very short of my expectations socially, and I hated Memphis. I was depressed, rapidly gaining weight, and drinking heavily, but when I visited Alana in late winter of 2004, I fell in love with Boston and saw a glimmer of hope for my remaining academic years. I transferred to Northeastern the following fall.
We had one school year together before she decided to transfer to UNC Chapel Hill. I tried to understand her reasons, but it was difficult to accept that I would be separated from my partner in crime yet again, after I'd moved 1,000 miles from home to a city I'd just started to explore. At the time I was dating my first serious boyfriend, so knowing I still had an emotional support in Boston lessened the sting a bit, but I had a hard time not resenting her for it.
Despite all the chaos (and there was plenty more to come), we remained close until we graduated college in 2008. At her enthusiastic prompting, we signed up to go on our 40-day Thailand adventure that June.
The end of the Thailand trip (photo bombed by a fellow traveler); Bangkok; July, 2008.
When we got back to the U.S., she moved in with her then-boyfriend, which rapidly led to their marriage and the birth of their beautiful daughter. I adore Ray and Ella, so as rough as it was to lose proximity to her a second time, her return to North Carolina turned out better than I could have possibly hoped. We're both now busy leading very different lives, but even after all this time, we do what we can to see each other at every opportunity and keep each other posted on our most important life developments. And I will never, ever forget that she found a way to come to both of my grandparents' funerals, pushing aside myriad logistical issues that would have stopped anyone else.
I tried drawing her approximately a million different times before I had to give up and settle on this one. As you can see in the photos above, she's much prettier than I'm able to draw her... but the photo I based this on captures the spirit that I love so much about her. We're both a little crazy, she and I, but we understand each other; she is, without a doubt, my best friend.
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