I know you’ll tease me for even writing something like this because you tease me for almost everything I do, but this all has to be said. I need you to know how much I love you, how much I appreciate you and how thankful I am to have you in my life.

We became friends by chance. I always viewed you as that chubby little boy who asked me out when we were 10-years-old. I never took the time to see your witty sense of humor or your infectious personality. But then we went to that movie, both sharing a hatred for anything scary, and the rest is history.

You quickly became my person. You became the one I would come to if I needed an honest opinion or something to laugh about. You taught me how to never take things too seriously, how to find the fun in almost anything and you even attempted to teach me how to drive stick. You were always the one I would want to tell if I had big news or needed someone to just listen. You helped me through heartbreak, you were there for all of my important milestones and you were the best prom date I could have ever asked for. You are my person.

Thank you for always knowing how to take a joke and never being afraid to give it right back to me. Thank you for just showing up at my house whenever you pleased and loving my family almost as much as I do. Thank you for giving me that hug when I came out of the pool crying from the pain in my shoulders after that mile-long swim. Thank you for the hour long FaceTime conversations and for not hanging up when all I did was vent to you about my pointless drama. Thanks for the countless rides home when I was always out of your way, the random texts to see how I am doing and for taking the effort to get to know my friends (even though you always tried to hit on all of them). I don’t know how I got so lucky to have a friend like you but I would not trade what we have for anything.