I may have only spent two years in Girl Scouts (I mean Brownies—I never actually made it to being a full-fledged Girl Scout), but that song is forever seared in my mind: “Make new friends, but keep the old / One is silver and the other’s gold.” We’d sing it standing in a circle at the end of every meeting, and every time I would think to myself that we all know that a gold medal is better than a silver one. What is this song really saying? That we should all run out and make newer, better friends?
In high school, particularly during my junior and senior year, I spent almost all my time with my two best friends, whom I’ve known since middle school. We had all the same classes. We suffered together through mountains of homework, IB exams, and college applications. If we ever had any free time, we’d lie on each other’s bedroom floors late at night and talk for hours. We were so inseparable that at the end of senior year, our parents held a joint grad party for the three of us. I have never felt as loved, as cared for, or as understood, as I did when we spent time together.
And then, we went off to college, three peas torn from the pod and scattered across the country. We vowed that we’d FaceTime every week, that we’d write real, paper letters, that we’d stay just as close as we’d always been.
And, for a little while, we did. The first couple of months at Kenyon were hard. Before coming to college, the longest I’d ever been away from my family was three weeks. And then, suddenly, there I was, in an unfamiliar place with unfamiliar people, knowing it would be months before I’d see home or my family again. It had been years since I’d been forced to make so many new friends. Being the introvert I am, I let new people into my life very slowly, even as I longed to interact with people like I’d known them for the past ten years. At times, I wondered how my friends from home were doing (Who was having more fun? Who had more new friends?), but I knew that they were always there for me, going through the exact same experiences. I may have never written them a single letter, but I diligently kept up our Snapchat streaks.
When we were finally reunited over winter break, I could tell that something had changed. I was so excited to see my two favorite people again, but they weren’t the same people I’d left behind back in August. For that matter, I know I wasn’t the same, either. We spent hours trying to catch each other up on everything that had happened in the months we’d been apart, but I still felt like there was so much of my friends’ lives that I was missing out on. Over the course of my first year, I often worried that I was losing my best friends to more exciting people and parties and jobs and boyfriends—that I didn’t even really know who they were anymore.
Now that I’m in my second year at Kenyon, I’m not lonely anymore. I’ve made friends at school whom I know I can rely on. Friends for whom I care very deeply, friends with whom I share meals and long conversations. Friends who will study with me when I need motivation. I have a wonderful roommate who gives me all the snacks and support I could ever need. I am so thankful to be a part of their lives. When I returned to school this August, I couldn’t wait to see them again and hear all about their summers.
I understand that my friends from home and I have our own lives now, and I’m okay with that. My high school guidance counselor would joke that we were all the same person. But, he didn’t spend enough time getting to know us to see that we’re not. In high school, I was constantly measuring myself against them. Was I good enough? Was I doing enough? Was I going to attend a college as prestigious as they were? In retrospect, that thinking was unhealthy. Whenever I start thinking that way now, wondering if my resume looks as good as theirs, if I’m challenging myself enough, I remind myself that such comparison is futile now. We attend three very different schools, and we’re on three very different paths in life. We’re busy with our college lives, and we don’t talk as much as we used to. When we do see each other again over breaks, though, I am always beyond happy to hear about everything that goes on in seemingly foreign lives.
These days, I don’t know who to call my “best” friends anymore, and sometimes it’s hard to balance what seems like two very different lives and social circles. All I know is that I’ve made new friends, and I’m trying hard to keep the old. And they’re all gold to me.
Image Credit: Feature, Esther Whang, Hannah Haynes