Good friends are hard to find. Sometimes, too many times, as kids, we often think we’ve found our BFF only to find out we were wrong. Then we become adults and realize finding a friend who will stand by your side through the best times and the worst times and every. Single. Solitary. Thing. Is harder than finding a needle in a haystack.
I guess that’s why I will drive to the ends of the earth to help my children maintain friendships with good humans they enjoy spending their time with.
The thing is, life can kinda suck. Yes, it’s important to have friends who will laugh with you for hours over the silliest things. And it’s important to have someone you can tell your deepest darkest secrets to. But there is so much more to friendship, that you really only realize as you age and grow.
Your friends are going to go through a really rough time and you won’t know how to help them. Friendship means doing what you can anyway. You’ll have to go above and beyond for the people you love the most. Friendship, true friendship, is about making it through the worst times, together.
When we moved our young family four towns away from where the kids were born, we left behind a group of five friends with whom my then-four-year-old was very close. For two years after that, I’d drive an hour and a half if she was invited to play, such was the ease I wanted to provide to bridge the distance and keep the friendships intact.
My kids’ closest friends are the friends who live the farthest from us. These friends are good friends. They are kind friends. They are loving friends. They are friends my kids have known since birth. I so very much want these kids to be the focal point of my kids’ tribe as they grow. I trust these kids. I know these kids.
I’m willing to drive to the ends of the earth to maintain friendships I consider healthy ones. I will be a chauffeur. I will do whatever it takes to support friendships that I am confident will help my kids manage life as they grow. Lord knows they’ll meet enough people as they go through school who won’t have their best interests at heart. I won’t have much control over that. What I do have control over is facilitating and encouraging quality relationships now.
Maybe these kids will grow up to be jerks. But, as long as they continue to be positive influences, I will continue to do everything in my power to keep the spark of friendship and love and respect among these kids alive.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from having the same best friends for thirty years, it’s that having someone who knows you and who cares about you and who has your back, no matter what, is worth its weight in gold, and you are never ever too young to meet that friend.
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