B.F.F. We wore those three letters on matching charm bracelets, wrote it on Facebook walls with “Happy Birthday” wishes, and had it on the one half-of-the-heart necklaces that we bought at Claire’s with our designated best friend forever. So, are those B.F.F’s the same people now, a decade after you last wore that half-a-heart necklace every day? For me, and I think for a lot of twenty-somethings, some of our B.F.Fs really are forever, even if we have a few new additions to our squad.
So what does this have to do with my junior year of college? Now that I’m halfway through my college years, I’ve watched myself lose touch with some friends while growing closer to others, and finding new friendships along the way. It’s inevitable that as time goes on and people go their separate ways, friendships go through transitions too.
But back to that concept of “best friend forever.” Well, I really do have friends that deserve to be recognized by those three little letters. Friends who, even if we’ve outgrown the jewelry section at Claire’s, I’d still rock matching B.F.F. charm bracelets with any day.
This past weekend, I drove to Delaware to visit my O.G. B.F.F., who I met when I was only five years old. Fifteen years later and I was traveling across state lines to spend the day with her over the long weekend. And you know what? I was just as happy to be hanging out with my best friend in her new apartment as I was to have a play date with her after kindergarten.
My weekend of revisiting old friends continued when I ran into my former dance teammate at a party, a one in a million chance that we both happened to be visiting Delaware at the same time, let alone ending up at the same get-together. And just like that, we were talking about our days of competitive dance, what we were up to now, and who we had kept in touch with. Running into an old friend unexpectedly was an amazing surprise, and just reminded me that friendships never really disappear forever.
So even if you and your best friends are spread across the country, B.F.F still means forever. Whether we’re juniors in college, juniors in high school, or still in junior high, nothing changes when you’re really best friends forever. Meanwhile, I’m going to work on making friendship bracelets come back in style.