Everyone that graduated high school or college has a story or multiple stories about their friends from that time. Most of the stories end with a solemn goodbye and never speaking again except in parting glances and Facebook posts. This is a kind of letter to those friends that I left behind and how I’m not sorry for that.

When I entered high school, I had minimal friends and they weren’t even good friends. But in 10th grade, I left those friends for personal reasons and had to stumble around trying to find new ones. In 11th grade I joined the track teams, both indoor and outdoor, and made a lot of friends that had similar interests. I became more sociable and outgoing. Previously, I wouldn’t leave my house for any reason. I would go to school and come home. I wouldn’t go anywhere that didn’t have my parents coming as well.

When I made these friends, my parents had to give me a curfew of 9 p.m. on weeknights and 11 p.m. on weekends. That was a curfew my sister had and my parents made a point to treat us the same. My parents just drove me to town and if it was late, I would text or call and tell them I was staying at someone’s house for the night and would need a pick up in the morning. When I was 17, almost 18, I got my license and drove around everywhere with my friends in my 2003 Ford Escape. I still had to abide by the curfew but as long as I texted or called my parents, they were cool with everything. The only rule being that if I got a ticket for anything, my license was gone.

I don’t know when it happened, though I’m guessing it was in summer of 2013. I had just finished my first year of university and made a large handful of new friends. I had come home and noticed that a lot of my friends and classmates didn’t go anywhere. My friends were just like they were high school. It was off putting, but I pushed it aside because they were my friends. At the end of my high school career, my sister and I ended up having a lot of the same friends. If she couldn’t get a hold of me while I was hanging out with my friends, she would call my friends. My mom was the same way. My mom eventually became the cool mom, but that’s a story for another day.

Like I said, I don’t know when it happened but this summer is the first summer that I’m actually home in four years without a job or anything to sustain my time. I’m rekindling my friendships from high school and even making new friends with people in my hometown (thank you Pokemon GO).

But we haven’t gotten to the sorry part, the thing is: I’m not sorry that I left these friends behind. Our lives drifted apart and while some of them are still good and kind, others are not and I had to leave them behind to help myself. Though a lot of those friends are still the same as they were in high school, I wouldn’t give up or trade away those experiences or memories for the world.