Friends are like kinds of chocolates. There are a huge variety of them, all with different shades and flavors. A few of them will forever be your kind of chocolate because you have always been used to them. They are the first Hershey Kiss you tasted, and they will forever be in your life because they grew up with you. They have something other friends do not have. They have memories of you and them when you were little, like when you learned how to ride a bike and when you spent your life on a swing during summer time. The thing with chocolates is that you can always have them, or you can always stop eating them. We usually love chocolate and all kinds of candy when we are little when we don’t know how harmful they can be for our cholesterol and our bodies. We enjoy any kind of chocolate because we are not afraid to try any flavor. And when we are little, any chocolate flavor is appreciated. Who cares if there is caramel or cherry inside them?
When you are little, most kids who share their favorite toys or help you learn how to ice skate become your best friends – ”forever”. Whether you hang out with them after school because they are your neighbors or whether they’re your soccer partners during lunch, you preserved them and love to spend time with them because you enjoy their company. This kind of friend is the one you usually remember when you reminisce about preschool and kindergarten. This friendship always made you smile and made you wish that you could go back and make those memories with them all over again. This kind of friendship makes you want to go back to those times when everything was easy and when having a friend only required a “hello” and “I’ll see you later”. This kind of chocolate makes you reminisce about the wrapper it was first advertised with and about those summer days you shared your favorite candy with your friends. If you are lucky, this kind of chocolate is still around to remind you how some things just never get old. It reminds you how you and your friends used to sing songs together from a band you probably no longer remember. Hershey Bars will always be your favorite if you are into this kind of chocolate. Even if you are not, I can guarantee that you have a favorite chocolate bar and that this friend happens to fall into this category. They will always be one of your favorite friends.
Have you ever heard of a Mars bar? Probably not, right? There are some kinds of bars that are around only for a short period of time and then they leave. Sometimes you wonder why, but sometimes you don’t wonder at all. They may appear because they’re seasonal, or a way to say ”let’s have fun, try me, enjoy me, then we will see what happens next.” This kind of friendship is probably found at your summer camp, in your grandma’s neighborhood or while studying abroad. You have a taste of this friendship and you feel like you have found the best flavor in the world. They are so exquisite and so delicious to be around, you do not want to let go. But when it is taken off the shelves, you need to let go. The goodbyes are always awkward, but you still treasure every single little memory you had with them. This friend shares more happiness than sadness, and this friend will forever love the way your summer skin looks and the way you stayed up with them during summer nights. This friend shows you all their life in three months. And because they are only with you for a short period of time, you always wonder what happened to them after not hearing from them for a while or after being unable to find them on a social network. This friend probably saw the fun and happy side of you, making you unforgettable.
Snickers are the everyday kind of bars: you crave chocolate, and these yummy bars are the first thing you can get your hands on.The kind of friends who relate to this type of commodity are the ones who you are accustomed to seeing every day, whether they are those from high school who you stood with in the morning before classes began or those who you share the same stories with over and over again because you see them so often. You appreciate this kind of friend because they are always there, no matter what you look like on rough days or how sad you seem to be sometimes. They are always there to hear you complain about soccer practice, your locker space, your boyfriend’s mood and your high school minimum wage job. This kind of friend will forever make you appreciate high school and the memories you made with them in the hallways, at football games, at basement parties, during bus rides and at track practices. When you stop craving this bar or haven’t had it in a while, you forget a little bit about them, not because Snickers are not important but because you have grown up. And, when you grow up, candy is not as essential as other carbs. But when you see one, you remember it, embrace it, and love it—and you forever preserve its flavor.
New and exciting friends—those are your Milky Way friends. They are adventurous and wild. They are so insane but so sweet at the same time. They are the kind of friends who you think you will forever be with because they have helped you through breakups, bad times, bad grades, bad hookups and bad days. These friends listened to your adventures and mistakes. But even though they never judged you and they always advised you so that you didn’t make the same mistakes, these people are the temporary ones. You may want to try to preserve them, but you know they are bad for you so you either walk away from them or they walk away from you. Either way, they are not forever in your life. They are not your bridesmaids or your best man and you are completely okay with that, because who wants to eat a Milky Way every day? These kind of friends teach you their bad habits. They are the ones who might influence you to open your mind to new ideas.They will hold your hair when you’re drunk and they will feed you when needed, but these friends know so much about your life – too much – and sometimes this becomes baggage. Your problems become theirs, and the energy in the friendship changes. Sometimes you don’t know how you lost your Milky Way in your book bag, and sometimes you decide to leave it on your desk until you are ready for it. Milky Ways also get messy and they expire, and it’s best to let go before they give you a stomachache and before you no longer like them anymore. It is okay to not have them. It’s actually really healthy to let go, because a Milky Way will always give you the same feeling—and when you are older, that same feeling is no longer as healthy as you think. A ten-year-old can eat ten Milky Ways a day, but you can’t. You need to care about yourself and body first, and that is how it is with this friendship. Remember, it’s always for the best.
There are friends who you have in your life because you just simply enjoy them. You like what they stand for, you enjoy the things they enjoy and, most importantly, you respect them and would not mind having them around as much as they want to be. These friends are your Kit Kats: fun and not overwhelming. This friend is the kind you can ask for help at any time. They will help you go grocery shopping or they will go to the alcohol store with you. The pretty thing about this friendship is that you both know too much about one another but not enough to make things messy. These friends are chill like a Corona on a summer day, and you like that.You enjoy doing the most random things with them, and they will always be in your life in some way or another. These ones are the friends who will wish you Happy Birthday on Facebook even if you haven’t talk to them in 10 years. I think they are rad because they never expect things from you. They just love you, no matter what. To be honest, these kinds of people are the ones who you should appreciate the most in your life because they are always one call away.
Now I have to say that there are always levels both chocolate and friendships. Ferrero Rocher is the fancy candy that you always want but never buy because they are too darn expensive. Who wants to spend ten dollars on chocolate? The funny thing with this is that when you have them, they taste absolutely delicious. This chocolate helps you feel better about anything that is going wrong in life. Your best friends are this kind of chocolate: they are the ones who should be the most valuable ones in your heart. These friends are the ones that – just with their presence – will make you feel like you can accomplish anything in life. Your best friends are those who will yell at you for not texting them every day and will call you to talk about how beautiful or ugly it is outside. This kind of friend will invite you to an ice cream date in the middle of the winter. They will get you from the end of the world after you hooked up with a horrible guy, and they will buy you a pregnancy test just because they can. These friendships develop over the years or even in a few weeks. The connection you have to this kind of individual is deeper than time and life situations. No matter what it is, they will always help you find a way to deal with anything and everything. They will keep your secrets, they will cry with you when needed and they will always be proud to say “I love you, too.” Whether you have one best friend or five, this is the kind of friend you should preserve and keep for life no matter how hard it is or how far away you live, no matter how much you don’t like their significant other or how much you fight. This friend does not get up and walk away. They will annoy you for a week just to let you know they care, and they will call you out when you are being a bad friend. You need them and they need you. We all need bridesmaids, friends who will go to the strip club with you and friends who will have your back when you are broken. The special thing about them is that they want to be in your life without you having to try so darn hard. They will text you random things and will point out the future the two of you will have together in 40 years. The awesome thing with this is the amazing feeling you will get when you two laugh about growing old together.
No matter what kind of chocolate is your favorite or what kind of chocolate sickens you the most, it’s always nice to understand that we will always have these different kinds of people in our lives. Whether we like other human beings or not, we will always have people who surround us and give us amazing energy or bad energy. You will always need someone to hug you during dark days and someone who will defend you against others who do not understand who you are. A friend can be momentary, temporary or forever, but you are the one who decides what you want them to be. As you grow older, you learn what is good for you and who is good for you. You learn that vibes and energies do exist, and you start to learn who truly cares about your life and issues. You have to understand that there are human beings who want to let you know that the mistakes you have made in your past do not define you, and they are also those individuals who stop you from wanting to ignore the world. They are those beautiful energies in your life who take your hand and walk with you through anything. They are quiet when you want them to be, and they are loud when they need to be. At the end of the day, these friendships will not only mark your life in one way or another, but they will make you change. They will change the way you think about others and they will help you find pieces of who you are. Appreciate them, love them, and hug them tight when they need you. And for those who did not make it because they give you bad cholesterol or their energy did not connect with yours—thank them, too. Thank them because they gave you their heart once. Allow them to walk away, because you don’t know what they need and you are unable to offer it to them. In the end, we are all human. The only thing we need to learn when people walk in and out is that we all have a different story, and we should embrace it and be kind to one another, no matter what.
Image Sources:
Hershey Bar: Hershey’s
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