the time i made some college BFF’s

There was an article on NPR yesterday that said the most lasting friendships form during the first semester of college.  These friendships are, in large part, a result of two factors: race and proximity. We tend to glom onto people that look like us and live near us.
I was a white girl in a dorm, at a university known for accepting more women than men, so friending was like shooting fish in a barrel.  There were a couple of false starts, but I remember meeting the ones that mattered. Here are a few that made the cut; that now, eight years and several thousand miles away, are still people I find myself wanting to report to about life.

Stephanie
It was the first or second day of college and our floor was getting together for a volleyball game. Me, and a hodge-podge of tanned freshmen were weaving through the suites looking for people to join our team. I always prided myself on my volleyball skills and I’m not sure why. I’d been cut from both the 7^th and 8^th grade teams and by high school it dawned on me that I’d better just give up while I was behind. Still, I was looking for a chance to redeem myself.

My rag tag group entered one of the suites and that’s when I laid eyes on Stephanie. She was standing by a closet wearing Umbros and a Hendersonville t-shirt and I remember thinking that Umbros always reminded me of playing soccer and I wondered if she played soccer. She did. She had (has) red hair and freckles and was delightfully effusive and pretty and I had a very clear thought. “That girl is much nicer than me. I will make her my friend.” We all went down to play volleyball and, for some redneck reason, I was wearing overalls.
As soon as we started playing, I noticed my suitemate Ashlie walk by. I yelled out “Hey Ashlie, come play volleyball,” just as the ball careened across the net, hit me on the top of my head and knocked me over into the sand. I was stunned and mortified, realizing I had failed miserably at coming off as the cool “bump set spike” type I felt was at the heart of my personality. Stephanie waved politely from the other side of the net. Turned out she and I had Women’s Studies together so we got to bond over gender inequality and our professor’s lazy eye.

Sarah
Sarah was the kind of friend everyone dreams of having in college. She didn’t worry about the things I worried about and had the guts to say the things I wouldn’t. Sarah was standing out on the balcony one afternoon smoking a cigarette. She looked over at me lazily and said “Hi… I’m Sarah.” I liked her immediately.

Hanging with Sarah was like a warm summer day.  I had a tendency to be a little frenetic and I found Sarah’s lack of urgency to be calming, inspiring even. She had a propensity for shit talking, an appreciation for wine, and a record player. A few days after we met she introduced me to her room mate.

Meredith
This was not the first time I had seen Meredith. I recognized her from the Chapel Hill soccer team that beat us to a pulp in seventh grade. And in eighth grade. And ninth and tenth. I quit after that. I remembered how she dribbled circles around us and  scored goals right in my face when I was playing sweeper.

I also noticed that despite her mad soccer skills she always managed to look pretty on the field, which I found to be incredibly insulting. As I hulked along, red faced, squinting, almost vomiting at times, Meredith just pranced around the field kicking balls in goals like it was a fucking party.  I was surprised she’d ended up on my floor and I thought, “What a small world.” She had no idea who I was.

When I met her she was very shy, sitting in the corner folding laundry—not the soccer hotshot I expected. I was glad she didn’t throw me any ‘tude cause I was ready to give it right back to her. I later discovered she was the sweetest, most loyal person; the kind you really had to try get in a fight with. After a brief conversation, I decided to add her in my friend arsenal. Much like Steph, she struck me as a bit of an angel, and I figured it would do a bitch like me good to have some nice friends.

Claire
One morning after, what I believe was a semblance of a one-night stand; I went into Sarah’s room to report on the previous night’s events. I have no recollection of who I’d  hooked up with or what happened but I stood there (in the clothes from the night before) and yammered on about whoever this dude was and how it had changed my life. Sarah did the polite nodding and “uh huh” and giggling, but Claire just stared at me, straight-faced, unaffected, boring into my soul. After about half the story and several unsuccessful attempts to get a reaction out of her it dawned on me, “This girl thinks I’m fucking Retarded.”

I hastily wrapped up my spiel and stood awkwardly in front of Sarah and Claire, my silent audience. I was a moron.

After a moment Claire looked me dead in the face and said, “Well, I’m just happy to hear someone got some ass last night. All we did was sit around here. You wanna come to brunch with us?” We went to brunch that day and many more after that.