—I HOPE YOU’RE HAPPY NOW

THE THING ABOUT BEST FRIENDS (Redux)

       People laugh when I tell them that one of my best friends is fourteen years old. 

       They think I’m pranking. Making an odd joke. That maybe I’m toasted and my edges are fraying.

       When I tell them that I’m not, that I’m sober and serious, they chuckle again, but in a sort of stilted manner, which right away lets me know they think I’m strange.

       But I get it—fourteen and my age—that’s a heady differential. What they’re thinking is:

       How would that work? 

       How much could you possibly have in common?

       What would you even talk about? 

       And always, at the end of it, they throw in something like, Anyway, you know he’s fourteen, right? And you’re what, 95?

       (Not 95 yet, but getting there, hopefully.) 

              That best friend in question is Dane, my nephew, a fascinating person who I adore unabashedly. We’ve known each other his whole lifetime now, and, so far, it’s been pretty great. Mostly, it’s been epic. He’s him, and I’m me, and we connect.  In so many ways, we’re a lot more alike than different, despite the chasm of years.

       The thing is, this guy makes me feel like I’m fourteen a lot of the time. Or younger than that. Or, he makes me see the world like a fourteen-year-old does, which is infinitely better than an adult’s view of things, mired in network news, which only portends catastrophe and end times.

       Some of the hardest laughter moments I’ve ever had have been with him, with Dane, and the majority of those were before he turned fourteen. 

       Last week, we saw a movie. Afterward we had an early dinner and for dessert we ate a mountainous Almond Joy Sundae, which meant I wouldn’t need to eat again for a week. During that time, we laughed/cried. We reminisced regarding our anguish together at a screening of “Roadrunner,” the documentary about the late Anthony Bourdain.

       He told me secrets and I told him some of mine. 

       I think that’s what best friends do.

       We share music. His knowledge of music—every kind—is off the charts (the other day, he showed me some freaky Incubus videos/songs I’d never heard of, or seen).

       As with all best friends, there’s no fear of judgment between us when we share things. Or when we mess up. Or when we don’t completely get each other.

       What we have together is safety. An easy comfort.

       I also get a hard time from people when I say I have seven best friends. “How can you have more than one best friend?” they’ll ask. 

       That’s a fair question. But I guess, in my mind, I think a best friend is the first person you want to share things with—the good news, or bad news, or something exciting, or interesting—that comes your way. 

       They’re the first person you call, or text, and for me it’s this group of seven I feel very, very lucky to have. And Dane, my nephew, just happens to be one of those. 

       Why should I care that he’s only fourteen? Sometimes he sounds smarter than any adult I know. Sometimes he brings clarity to things too cloudy for me to see or understand.

       Whenever I do text him, he gets right back to me. (I think best friends are those that text you back sooner than later, and if they don’t respond at all, well then, they’re not really your best friend, are they?) His replies are always authentic—funny, or concerned, or sarcastic, sometimes with inside-joke verbiage only he and I understand.

       For example, on his birthday last year, he sent me this: 

       “Holy chair. I’m chairing thirteen! How the chair did I get this old? I can’t chairing believe it!!”

       (For some context… One day, when Dane was visiting with his mother, I accidentally said, “Shit.” Dane’s mother softly castigated me for it. I went into defensive mode and playfully said, “I will stop swearing when you can tell me who gets to decide what’s a swear word, and how they were selected to decide such a thing. Like, why isn’t ‘chair’ a swear word?” From then on, “chair” became our (Dane and my) euphemism for any curse word.

       In the Anthony Bourdain documentary we saw together two months back, there’s a part where a friend describes Bourdain as this tremendous lover of all things art—music, film, photography, books, architecture, painting—and whenever he discovered a new piece of art, the first thing he wanted to do was share his love of it with his closest friends. I’m the same way. Sometimes the art is really obscure. Sometimes it’s dark or bitter yet riveting, as with the Sam Fender song, “Seventeen and Going Under” that I’m currently obsessed with.

       Dane may not get what a “snuff video” is, or what “Bizzies” are, or what “WDP” means, but he got the gist of the story, the rancor, regret and angst. He appreciated the artistry involved, which I did, too.

       And then, right back, he sent me a video/song he was presently enjoying, though totally different, but I loved it as well.

       That’s friendship—sharing something you love with someone who you feel might find value in it, as do you. And if they don’t love or enjoy it in the same manner the sender does, that’s okay. The sending of the song/video was an expression of love, of trust.

       And that’s Best-Friendship.

       The thing about best friends—and, as you know, I believe you can have several, but not too many, because it takes a great deal of time and effort to be a best friend—is finding, savoring, and further expanding, your connection.

       It’s understanding how rare the relationship is, fortifying it with genuine love and attention whenever possible, and reaping all that joy together. 

       In fact, here’s a text I just got from him as I was writing this and we were giving each other chair…

       “There you go, chairing with me again…”