Last night, Sean and I were talking about how the title "best friend" (aka BFF) gets tossed around so lightly... and tagged on the wrong (or on too many) people. When I was a sophomore in HS, I made that mistake. I never really used that label again.
In ninth grade, there was a guy I had a couple classes with. In Science, he was in my group with another good friend of mine and the three of us became pretty close. We would talk on the phone during th wake of three-way calling, watching TV together from our separate homes. And long before our freshman year was over, I had already dubbed him my "guy best friend." He was the only male I knew who fed my writing itch by had notes for me in exchange to the ones I handed him in the halls during passing period. And because I have always been pretty blind about guys liking me, I didn't even pick up on the fact that he walked a few miles during Christmas break to drop off a three-foot teddy bear at my house.
After our mutual friend confirmed that he had always had a crush on me, I began to panic. And I did the most un-best-friend-like thing: I started to avoid him. I tried to be sly about it at first, and then eventully, I simply ignored all his efforts to pursue the same friendship I had always enjoyed - even when he never made any unusual or inappropriate advances beyond our usual exchanges. In fact, I never even gave him the chance to share his feelings nor did I give him a reason for my sudden distant attitude toward him: the guy I claimed to be my best friend.
Not long after that, I started hanging out with another girl to stay way from my usual path of contact with him. And perhaps I felt a need to have a "best friend," she inherited the title very quickly and without having to prove her worth to me. She said I was her best friend too, so how could I go wrong with that decision, right? Well karma bit back with a vengeance after what I had done just a few short months earlier and yet, when all the drama was flying about, my 15year-old self-centered nature couldn't believe my "best friend" could betray me. How dare she be so careless with our friendship?!
I went through the rest of high school working on my friendships with others. The cheerleaders and jocks, the decathalon team members, the wallflowers, the gangbangers of Fontana - I was in good terms with them all. In fact, I was voted "Friendliest" my senior year. Yet I always feared the curse of the title, and even when someone had finally earned her place on that stand, I still referred to her as my "closest friend."
Because up until last night, I used to think that claiming someone as your best friend raised one's expectatitions to almost unattainable levels. You wanted them to be beyond human and incapable if disappointing or hurting you, especially on purpose. But then it dawned on me: maybe we look at it all wrong. Perhaps giving someone the "best friend" title doesn't describe how they should treat me, but instead how I already treat them now.
So just before we fell asleep, I told Sean that I wanted there to be nobody on this planet who appreciated and loved him more completely than I do... and that I would do my best to ensure my actions reflected those sentiments. It doesn't mean we will not disagree or misunderstand each other - we ARE married, after all. (Lol.)
But the way I see it, in my limited comprehension of this wide, vast universe, if I claim to to have married my "BFF," shouldn't my husband receive better treatment from me than any other person he comes in contact with - including his own family with whom he left in order to build a future with me? And at the very least, shouldn't I treat him better than I do all my other friends?
Food for thought...
