~2/2/18~
Friendships. Hardships. Two different things but the funny thing is, one can turn into the other. Now I am the kind of girl who doesn't need a whole lot of friends. I am good with the 2 or 3 super close friends and I'm set for life. Now that's just me. Some people need to be a part of a group. They need to have their "squad" that consists of 8, 9 or even more people. Everyone is different on who and how they have friendships with. Friendship is such a weird concept to me. One day I might not even know a person and then the next we spark up a conversation on who knows what. Days pass by and you keep wanting to talk to this person then you get to the point where you decide "hey I kind of want to keep this person in my life forever." When just the other day you were complete strangers. Friendships can evolve over a couple days or even multiple years. I can say that I have had both. This one girl I knew since I was about 7 years old. We danced at the same dance studio but never even become close friends until Middle school/High school. Now she is someone who I can't ever imagine not having in my life. I also made a friend in middle school where we literally became friends in a day and I thought we were going to be best friends for life and now I haven't spoken to her in 8 years. God puts these certain people in your life for a reason, whether it is to teach you something about yourself or to give you someone who you can rely wholeheartedly upon.
When I was about 8 years old I met my best friend. We were attached at the hip. Every single weekend I would be at her house. We would eat lunch together every day at school. If you ever saw me on my phone I was most likely texting her. We went on vacations together, attended all the birthday parties, went to prom with a group of friends and so on. This girl was the BEST best friend I could have ever asked for. We were always there for each other. Anytime I had something that was scary going on or stressful she would sit down with me and give me the best pep talk. We had always talked about being in each others weddings, letting our kids grow up together, and then becoming little old ladies while sitting in matching rocking chairs. Senior year of High school came around and we had finally made a group of girl friends. This was so exciting for us because since 3rd grade it had really just been me and her. She drifted. She got excited about having new friends. While she felt like she was making these great new friends, I felt like I was loosing one. A couple months went by. I would text her to see if she wanted to ride with me to the football game, and would get no response. A couple hours later she would respond to our group chat saying she was riding with someone else. I got jealous. I am not ashamed that I got jealous because I felt like my best friend was being taken away from me and forgetting me. That's exactly what was happening. We had a bit of a fight over me getting jealous and both of us needed to cool down. In December of 2015, we both attended a surprise birthday party for a friend. I was so nervous for her to show up cause we hadn't talked in weeks. After that night, of not saying a single word to each other, I decided to text her that evening. When I got home around midnight I sent her a text. "Why are we doing this? We are being so childish. We have been best friends for years and we are going to fight because of this little factor? You are someone I love and cherish as my best friend. I'm sorry." I sat and waited to get a response. It was about 1 a.m., but I knew she would respond (she was a night owl.) About 2 minutes after I sent the text ( but what felt like a life time) I saw my notification with her response light up my phone. As I go to open it, I expect to be receiving this big long text message about how we are being stupid and childish. What I received was "I don't even consider you a friend anymore." Here I am, 17 years old, sitting in my bed at 1 a.m., crying my eyes out. I had just lost my best friend. The partner to my crime for almost 12 years. I knew at this point in time there was no use in trying to argue with her about staying friends. The next morning I woke up to get ready for church. My eyes wouldn't even open up from me crying so much the night before. I walked into my parents room to find my dad putting on his tie. I said no words. I walked up and showed him my phone with the messages pulled up. The second I looked at my dad the waterworks started again. As he read all the messages from the night before, I sat on his bed with my face in my hands. Once my dad was finished reading he sat beside me and put his hand on my back. For the first couple minutes he just sat there with me and let me cry. After I had calmed down a little bit he told me to look at him. As I looked at my dad, tears quickly filling up my eyes, he said "Ansley, do you know what this is?" I shook my head with a HARD no and he looked back at me and said "This is God taking all the bad things out of your life just waiting to bring all the good in." I can promise you at that moment after my dad said that, I thought he was stupid and wrong and didn't know what the heck he was talking about. I can honestly say that I didn't understand what my dad meant by that statement until now. Looking back at that almost 2.5 years ago, I can place every single moment since then of when God put good in my life. Back to when I became Best friends with my best friend in January of 2016 and never thought I would have another relationship like the one before. To when I decided to room with my other best friend in March of that year and made one of the best decisions of my life. To when I got even closer to the friend I used to dance with even though we are miles apart at different colleges. To when I met my two new best friends in College of Freshman year and have only gotten closer since then. As opposed to about 2 years ago to when I had one best friend who didn't treat me like one back, to now when I have 5 best friends that are the reason my heart is filled with so much love. That was God. That was God working in my life. He knew the people I needed in my life and instead of meeting each other at the age of 4, I just met them a little later in life. The quantity of the length of a friendship doesn't even come close to the quality of it.
That's my story of friendship. Everyone has millions of different stories of friendships. Some people have never gone through the struggle of losing a friend. Some have gone through best friends passing away. Most of us can say we have had tons of friends that we just drifted apart from. A friendship that seems like the world to you one day can become a hardship in the blink of an eye. God sends people our way but it is up to us to decide what to do. Do we want to continue this friendship God has given us and grow and strengthen each other? Or do you decide that this person is not someone who you need in your life right now? Maybe that person needs to do some growing within themselves before they become close to anyone else. That's okay too. It might be hard some times. You might feel like the world is ending but its not. Remember that. Losing a friend is not the end of the world. Sure it might sting for a bit, but think about all the Good that God has planned that is about to come your way. Remember that. Look to him and get excited for all the good!
~As always, Keep your Eyes Wide Open and look to the Lord~
~"The righteous choose their friends carefully, but the way of the wicked leads them astray"- Proverbs 12:26
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