Best Friends are like Diamonds

It's been said that "Best friends are like diamonds, precious and rare. False friends are like leaves, found everywhere." As my best friend graduates from graduate school at the University of Miami this week, I can't help but reflect on how we got to where we are in our lives and still managed to maintain being the very best of friends.

We became friends playing basketball for a homeschool league in Tulsa in 2002. And while friends have come and gone in my life, Laura has always been a constant. Sure, we've had our ups and our downs. We've yelled at each other, cried with each other, judged each other, and gone days without speaking to each other. We've celebrated in each other' successes, laughed at each other's mishaps, and shared in enjoying many of life's milestones, and through it all we've remained the very best of friends. Laura is one of the very few people that I can spill my guts to and not fear that she's going to use my secrets against me. We know everything about each other. And even though we've lived the last seven years apart, I still dream of the day that we'll live in the same town and and our children will become friends and we'll sit on the patio and reminisce about the crazy times. The crazy times that consisted of racing cars across 101st and Sheridan and cutting across parking lots to see who could get home the fastest, partying throughout the summer nights of our Sophomore year in college, and having competitions about who could do wall-sits the longest.

Never once has Laura turned her back on me. She's stuck with me through a lot. In fact, I'll never forget the feeling that ran through me when I told her I had gotten my first college acceptance letter, to the University of Miami. She was genuinely more excited for me than I was for myself. I couldn't believe that I had a friend that cared so much. But clearly she cares. Shoot, she even talked her dad into switching wireless phone companies when my dad decided to switch plans, so that we could talk for free while we lived apart.

So, here's to you, Laura. As you graduate from grad school, I pray that God leads you down the path that is perfect for you and that you may find a home and a job that you are proud of. Whether we are provided the opportunity to see each other every day in the future, or only on our yearly girl's getaway, I look forward to what our friendship will grow into. If 10 years has been a blast, I absolutely cannot imagine what 20 more will be like. I love you.