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Illustration by Joy Kim
As a kid, I came to understand pretty quickly that a best friend was a title that shouldn’t be taken for granted. As kids, being a friend versus a best friend is the social currency that no amount of lunch box trading can obtain.
From the playground to the hallways of high school, my friends and my select best friends went through everything I went through, and vice versa. We shared all the typical things, like gushing about our latest crushes, sharing new-found developments of our bodies and everything else young girls exchange via IMs, text messages and eventually FaceTime. We grew up together and we became inextricably a part of each other’s lives.
Over the years, my friend group has changed as people move to different schools and towns, and some I came to understand weren’t friends at all. Out of all my grade school friends, I am blessed to still have one remaining. Sarah lives in a different province now but we’ve been best friends for almost 17 years and talk daily.
In college, I was part of a group of five young women. I came to appreciate our differences and enjoyed seeing conversations and ideas from their points of view. The group dwindled as the years went by and these losses of friends have taught me that sometimes people come into your life for a reason or just a season. Not everyone can live up to the pressure of a best friend.
Best friends know everything about you. They know the ugly version of you and can be your mirror when you can’t even look at yourself.
My best friends aren’t afraid to challenge me. We have inside jokes. We’re each other’s emergency contact at work. But somehow, the best friends I could always count on, are less available.
There’s a shift in the air, like when the seasons change. Some of my besties are in a serious relationship and I suddenly feel shaken and unsteady and somehow left out. As I near the end of my twenties, I am noticing a change about what it means to be friends as we get older.
I have shared this casually with my four best friends. They nod and assure me that nothing is changing, and yet I see them changing. I am changing. All of sudden we’re having to plan to get together further in advance – like I’m talking months! And now partners or significant others join our get-togethers.
I am realizing that as we get older, the role of friendship may be totally different than when we were younger. Now that we’re establishing adult lives, being a BFF isn’t the relationship status that we’re aiming for. We’re exchanging friendship bracelets for engagement rings and our weekend sleepovers for baby showers. The role of being someone’s friend or best friend is now becoming the role of the bridesmaid or godmother.
Perhaps the role of friendship and best friend are really placeholders in our lives until we find a partner, our other half.
My friend group is embarking on home ownership, marriage and having a first baby.
It happens so subtly: my friends can’t make it to something or their Saturdays are now spent with their partner. There’s no room for me in their adventure any more. The third wheel is not welcome.
I’m so conscious of this that I have vowed that should I find a romantic partner, I will work hard to ensure that I don’t lose my best friends.
Change is scary. So maybe that’s what all this is. We’re getting older, our lives are changing and I see the change all around me. The eight-year-old me is screaming inside and this new chapter seems bigger than the other ones. Not because we’re getting older or we’re moving further away from each other, but because there is someone else besides my best friends, trying to take them from me. I don’t hate my friends’ partners or wish them to be single, I just don’t want to lose my role in my friends’ lives. My sense of purpose is being taken and now I have to find something or someone new to fill it.
Friendship is so important and it’s a currency that can’t be traded or bartered or won. You earn it and you work hard every day for it. It’s a relationship. It has the same value as that as your family or a romantic partner. My friends and I are in our 29th year. We’re taking on the world and experiencing new adventures. Some of my friends are taking on love, some are taking on new cities and some are taking on new careers. All I know is that no matter what, I will be here, offering friendship in the best way I know how and working every day to earn a spot in their lives and hopefully they will continue to do the same for me.
No matter what our lives bring, whom our lives have in them or what roles we take on as we get older, I believe that my best friends and the friendships that we have will maintain and grow and evolve just like us. Just like we’ve done all these years. In fact, I’d like to believe that they will grow stronger and that we’ll always have room for each other in our lives no matter what.
BFFs forever.
Leila Goreil lives in Hamilton, Ont
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