I'll never forget the first thing I said to you when we met in third grade.

"You're really tall" I said, eye level with your chest.

I didn't know that day you would be my best friend for the rest of my life. I was only eight, I didn't even know how to write in cursive yet. But for 12 years it's always remained the same. We don't have to talk every day to know our friendship is real and lasting, sometimes we don't talk for what seems like weeks or a month. But at the end of the day, I'll always have you and you'll always have me. And I think that's something that is comforting in a time where friends are so fleeting, so temporary. Something concrete nowadays is reassuring, that the good things last.

Thank you for always letting me be myself.

I was quite the strange child, always putting on performances, putting on costumes, never too far away from a video camera. And you were right there with me while the other girls turned up their noses to the thought of being anything "embarrassing" We were us, I let you be you and you let me be me.

Thank you for every beach trip, every boardwalk adventure, and all the endless, numbered days we spent together during summer vacations.

We spent all day in the sand, and hours in the ocean playing every water game from chicken to my own creation, "flying squirrel". I'll never forget people watching on the boardwalk, wondering if we were going to meet some other 11-year-old boys, awkward and unsure of themselves, just trying to jam out to some Soulja Boy. Thank you for always including me in your pool days with your swim team friends, I never once felt out of place, and you always made sure of that.

Thanks for not growing up too fast like the other girls.

I’ll never forget playing every imagination game in the book with you, or watching Disney movies, or talking to Santa. We still liked the kiddie rides and going to the carnivals every summer. We didn’t care about growing up and texting boys as much as the other 13-year-olds did. We just wanted to be kids. Thank you for being that with me.

I’ll never forget our first beer.

I remember the day we stole that one beer from my fridge and biked down to my neighborhood park. We sat there in the dimly lit clearing and tasted beer for the very first time. I remember us saying it tasted like bread and I liked it a little more than you did. But I was probably just pretending.

Thank you for fan girling with me.

Dylan and Cole Sprouse, anything High School Musical, and of course Hilary Duff. We were dedicated fans that sang every word at recess, even printing out the lyrics sometimes. Even when the 8 ^th graders would stare at us we would run around belting “Breaking Free” like nobodies business, but still sometimes fight about who would be Gabriella.

Thanks for never crushing on the same boys as me (at least at the same time I was).

Not that we had much of a choice in grade school, considering we only had 8 boys in our class, but thanks for listening every time I told you some unrealistic story about touching hands with some snot nosed boy in 5 ^th grade, or pretending one stared at me for too long at play practice. Reading back on our old journals now I realize that we literally liked almost every single boy in our class at some point. And even the times that we secretly did, you’d still listen to me and I’d still listen to you like it was the most important thing in the world. Because, well we were 12 and it was.

Above all, I just want to thank you for every sleepover we spent writing songs for our fake band, romping around in the snow acting like freaks, embarrassing ourselves at volleyball practice, and every little memory in between. We watched each other grow up, we kept tradition and I know I don’t say it enough but you really have been the most constant thing in my life all these years. I know you’ll always have my back and I’ll always have yours.

Thank you for the memories and all the ones to come.