Saturday, July 7, 2012

Today {Vol. III}

Did you know that I have a lot of best friends? I'm very lucky that way. I met most of them in college and although they're all my soul sisters, my friendship with Melissa clicked quickly and grew incredibly fast.

We met through our friend - and my roommate at the time - Katie. She invited Melissa along on a trip to see the latest Harry Potter movie with our group of friends from our freshman floor. Somehow we ended up sitting next to each other, and before the movie even started, this happened.

If you've been reading this blog for any length of time, you've seen this photo before. Melissa's seen it ten billion times, because I tell this story any time I talk about her.

This is literally about a half hour after meeting each other. I mean, look at those faces. Clearly best friend material.

It was decided, amongst our group of four, that Melissa and I would be roommates in sophomore year. Our friendship exploded; that's really the only way to put it. Our dorm was lacking a little pizzazz, so three days in, we headed to the craft store and decorated with pipe cleaners and foam stickers. We made name tags for our closets. We had Disney-themed bedding. We decorated our toilet for Christmas.

This is a real, honest-to-goodness picture. We're... special. Also, can you have nostalgia for a bathroom?! Because that's happening right now.

Melissa has always, always, understood me the best, often without saying a word. Not only because we have similar personality traits - obsessiveness, a penchant for blogging, over-excitement, and criticizing the Home Shopping Network - but because she's an incredibly understanding person. Whenever I went through a difficulty, she took my "side," whatever it may be, even if I switched from one viewpoint to an opposite one within the same day.

This is how you tolerate industrial fans drying out your room after it floods: by taking model poses in front of it.

With Melissa, I have the silliest, funniest, happiest memories. We survived a dorm room flooding together ("we're dealing with it" ... that was our quote, wasn't it?), creepy bugs disappearing behind furniture, and getting stuck in stand-still, park-your-car-and-get-our traffic by making jokes every five seconds. But she's also the person who read my novel-length e-mails about any given situation in my life and responded with novel-length responses. That, to me, always showed how caring she was and how highly she regarded our friendship, because she was taking time out of her day to become invested in whatever was bothering me.

If you haven't already guessed, Melissa gets married today. I was incredibly lucky to watch her relationship with her soon-to-be husband, Matt, blossom from the very beginning. My favorite story is how we were craving pie one night after a poorly-planned, late-night viewing of The Food Network. Melissa was chatting with Matt - who was, at the time, still "just a friend" - via AIM and he suggested going out to a nearby diner, offering to drive us both over. Clearly, his intention was to win Melissa over, so I found in really thoughtful and charming that the invitation was extended to me as well. I don't know why, exactly, because Melissa said we both had cravings and he'd have to be a real dick to just offer to take Melissa out... but I did. He won me over in that moment, and if I ever had any doubt about what kind of guy he was, I'd think back to that and remember: a good one.

Yes, there is photographic evidence of The Trip for Pie. That guy's a KEEPER.

I cannot wait for this wedding. I cannot wait to see these two people, so in love and so perfect for each other, get married. It's going to be amazing.