Dear M.
I am sitting here, and I am crying my stupid eyes out, because I am SO happy for you. In my whole life I never imagined I would have a best friend like you. You are such an amazing person, and very often I wonder what I've done to deserve having a best friend, a sister by choice, like you. Sometimes people tell me "Oh, I have a best friend too" and then tell me a story or two, but in my heart I know they don't get it. You are so much more to me than a friend to do things with or a partner in crime (although you've been both at times). You are the only person who has ever told me that you are going to be there for me forever, and meant it. You are the only person in my life who has always given more than I ever had a right to expect, without ever making a single demand. It's trite, and often repeated on Hallmark cards and cheesy Lifetime movies, but nothing in my life feels real until I tell you about it, or until you're there to share it with me. When I think of everything we have gone through in the last 13 years I just can't imagine not having had you there by my side. Remember when?
- Matt broke up with me and I took my socks off outside that bowling alley and cried and cried?
- We made up the whorebird game?
- You lived with me in Texas and we went fishing and caught that eel and Troy tried to kill it?
- We made the HUGE vodka gimlets in Oklahoma City and tied the cat to a stake in the yard and got drunk and he got fleas but he meowed right along to Sublime?
- Leroy Jenkins Jones Junior?
- Pork Tenderloin and Bathmat?
- The punk rock Hyundai Excel?
- Christmas at your mom's...as retold by your little brother 5 months later? "She was DRUNK and she was YELLING!"
- Cracking my mom up inside that Ross?
- Ladies PUH-LEASE?
- Making up poems and trying to think of all the things that rhyme with "cock"?
- The dead guy shoes?
- The bar bathroom at AJ's?
- Crying our eyes out when Taylor got cremated and my mom spread her ashes out by the tree so she could be "with the squirrels she loved so much" and then put up the squirrel statue as a headstone?
- (IBWH)?
- The time you grounded your shoes before you got sick?
There are SO many moments in my life that have you in them, the big huge important ones like getting married and graduating from OTS, but also the small ones like deciding what color to dye my hair, or teaching you to make mashed potatoes. Practically every picture I have is of you and I. All over the country, with Diet Cokes and booze, and different soundtracks (Nine Inch Nails to Sublime to Lyle Lovett, but always coming back to Jimmy), with a parade of different boys, but no matter what, there we are together -- our own favorite company.
I have never laughed as hard with anyone else, or cried as hard in front of anyone else. And finally, finally, you've found someone that I think truly deserves you and is going to be able to treat you the way you deserve to be treated. You are the smartest, funniest, brightest, most beautiful and amazing person I've ever known or ever will know...and if this sounds like a love letter, it is. Because even if I had a sister, I'm just not sure I could ever feel this way about her, because I chose you, and I choose you every day to be my best friend. But what's truly amazing to me, is that you choose me back. Who knew that could ever happen? I wish that I had the right words to say all that is in my heart, but I am so happy for you and K. and I hope that you have such a wonderful life together. He is the luckiest man on the planet, and the reason I like him so much is that he seems to realize it...a historical first when it comes to men in either one of our lives. So, congratulations on a good man (and a pretty damn good ring too...you go girl!), and the start to a truly fabulous life together for both of you. I will always walk in front of you and swipe away the spiderwebs. I love you!!
