When I first met her she hugged me a little too tightly, grasped my arms and said “I just KNOW that this is going to be the best year of our lives and I cant wait to see what is in store for our relationship.” Whoa. Our relationship? The best year of our lives? Pretty sure I just met you. I am also pretty sure that I am not the only one who would be kinda creeped out by an introduction like that. And so it began, spending 9 months living with this girl. The recent movie “Roommate” has nothing on our experiences together. Except that she never tried to kill me. We may or may not have almost been killed together more than a few times, but she is the only person I have ever lived with that I didn’t want to kill at some point or another. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

Looking back now I have to laugh at the way she introduced herself. As creepy as it was, she was right. I had no idea what those 9 months of living together had in store for us but they were some of the best days of my life. I clearly remember the numerous times she would go to bed before me and promptly fall asleep, only to wake an hour later, jolt up in her bed and just stare at me. The first time she did this it totally freaked me out. She wouldn’t respond to me – she just stared with the biggest and bluest eyes I have ever seen. I quickly learned that this is perfectly normal for her. As the 9 months progressed and she continued to do this I was always tempted to mess with her when she was doing her awake-sleep-creepy-staring thing. I wondered how far I could go with her…if I could put a ton of makeup on her so that when she woke in the morning she had no idea how it got on her. I thought once about trying to lead her to the floor of the closet so that she would wake up there. But usually the thought alone was enough to amuse me so I stayed curled up in my bed to finish reading my book and eventually she would stop staring and lay back down.

I remember the time we went to Tennessee for Thanksgiving with the family we were boarding with during that school year. We were staying at this gigantic mansion of a home on some gorgeous lake. The Grandpa of the family had a collection of guns, motorcycles and a jet ski. We didn’t have a gun permit or motorcycle license so we decided to go jet skiing together on the lake. In 40 degree weather. Layered with wetsuits and winter clothing. Not sure which one of us had that brilliant idea but I don’t think the other one had any argument to the suggestion. We hopped onto the same jet ski and sped off into sunset over that lake, complete with scarves and gloves. It was beautiful, fun, and COLD. All was going well until the inevitable happened. We flipped. I don’t remember who was driving, but I am pretty sure it was her. What I do remember is that we had so many layers of clothing on that we were like two big blobs floating in the lake as the jet ski was 50 feet from us. Not only were we freezing and couldn’t swim with all that clothing on, but we were laughing hysterically. Which leads me to my next memory…

I remember laughing hysterically with her. All the time. Almost every day. I don’t know what it is but we have this thing where we just know how to make each other laugh. I remember the family we were staying with coming home one night and the two of us were literally laying on the kitchen floor laughing so hard that we couldn’t get up. They probably thought we were drunk but I assure you we were as sober as anything. To this day we still have the ability to make each other laugh with such ease that it should be a sin.

I remember driving 45 minutes into school each morning together. We always carpooled. But we never said a word on the way there, except “what time will you be done today?”. Never. We kinda just “got” each other with the morning thing. Neither of us were morning people so we just didn’t talk at all while getting ready or driving into school. It was like this silent agreement that we weren’t allowed asking anything that required any brain power. On the way home, however, you couldn’t shut us up.

I remember her calling me up last year asking if I wanted to take a trip from New Jersey to Florida with her to switch cars with her sister. She said I was the only one who she could bear the thought of being in a car with for 18 hours. So we did. We loaded up, drove 18 hours straight through, got to her sisters and stayed for 18 hours and then drove back home anther 18 hours. That could have been a suicide mission except that we had copious amounts of Swedish fish and sweet tea to keep us awake.

I remember going to Malta with her 8 months ago. Hands down one of the best trips of both of our lives. Not only did she let me go to the edge of a cliff and look straight down without saying “Hey, be careful”, but she joined me. We sat on the edge of that cliff looking three football fields down, our hearts raced with adrenaline, and our souls were as alive as ever. We ate some amazing Maltese food. We may or may not have checked out a Maltese guy or two. We talked about how we loved and missed our guys back home. We went scuba diving. We managed to drive on the opposite side of the road without crashing into anything or anyone – I drove, she navigated. The trip was relaxing, peaceful, adventurous, and so. much. fun. And there isn’t any other person I can think of who I would have had more fun with than her.

Katie and I have a friendship that year that is 6 years strong and only the beginning. The adventures we have experienced together have been some of the best and exciting moments of my life and I wouldn’t trade them for the world. So why am I writing an entire post about her? Because tomorrow Katie will become a Mrs. I couldn’t possibly be more excited for her, nor honored to stand by her side as she agrees to forever with the love of her life. We used to joke that we wish one of us was a guy so we could just get married because we get along that well. But, alas, we both found and fell in love with guys who are polar opposites of us. And I can think of no other person that is as perfect for Katie as Ty. It saddens me that she has to move to Dallas, but we have spent the majority of our relationship being long distances away so I have no doubt that we will continue to be BFF’s. And, Katie, some creepy 19 year old once said these words to me that I will now repeat to you: “I just KNOW that this is going to be the best year of our lives and I cant wait to see what is in store for our relationship.”

Love you…