By Deena BustilloPLAY Editor
We all have that friend. You know, the one who’s been there since day one -through awkward bangs in elementary school; cookie dough-filled nights of Lifetime man-hater movies in middle (and high) school; and years of hilarious, often tear-infested, moments in between. At least I hope you’ve all been so lucky – cookie dough-downing aside, it’s a big cavity magnet.
My super lame refrigerator magnet (located next to the grocery list with “Hey Shithead” printed at the top) even says “Best friends are the chocolate chips in the cookie of life.” Too bad my best friend Tracey hates chocolate chips so this gooey analogy really doesn’t work. For us it’s more like “Best friends are the freakin enormous spoonful of rainbow sprinkles jammed onto unbaked sugar cookie dough” – a tad wordy, but completely factual. I digress.
I have been best friends with Tracey since third grade, when I was the nothing-but-sweats tomboy and the unfortunate new girl who had been put in Tracey’s care for the first days of school. At that point she was burette- and cardigan-sporting, overly grown-up third grader who wasted no time bragging of her fabulous lake house. She told me if I was nice she might even take me.
Somehow we flash forward 11 years and I’ve been to that lake house more times than I can count – half-nude in annual Fourth of July boat parades, frying on the dock and yes, still devouring hearty logs of Pillsbury sugar cookie dough and glued to juicy Lifetimes. Some things never change – like our horrid movie taste.
That’s the beauty of it. She doesn’t care (that much) that I am semi-neurotic, and she not-so-patiently sits on the phone while I whine about the frigid weather – tenderly adding in that sunny California is 60 degrees and she’s clad in a super cute T-shirt with new Coach tennies. In the last decade she definitely ditched the burette in favor of all the things I wish I could drain my bank account on. Bitch.
In return, I deal with her mouth. It’s big – and the filter is seldom used, let alone turned on. At T-gives two years ago she yelled down the family dinner table, “I already tried your ugly-ass mashed potatoes!” when her dad asked her to try something else he’d made. She’s still living that one down with Grandpa.
Our lives are full of those uncanny experiences. And even though we fantasize about our respective success and mansions, (or if that fails, which one of us is going to house the other in the shack in the back of our mansion) I secretly think that we’ll end up old, unwanted hags together. At this point we’re the only ones we can stand (or can stand us), so we’ll be 80, watching the same Lifetime movies -hating men more than ever – armed with cookie dough and sprinkles. I can’t wait.
Medill junior Deena Bustillo is the PLAY editor. She can be reached at d-bustillo@northwestern.edu.
