The Tale of A Spunky Friend.

It was freshman year of high school, and I was really not a cool human being. But one day, this girl with an amazing fashion sense and ever-perfect hair waltzed over to me and handed me an invitation to her 15th birthday party. Her name was Jessica. And I was freakin' PSYCHED. I got invited to a cool person's birthday party. There was hope for my social life after all.

The party was awesome--I distinctly remember intense laughter and bonding among the group of teen girls--and from that point on Jessica and I were officially FRIENDS.

The next few years we hung out in the back courtyard at high school and bonded over youth dances and talking about crushes and movie nights at her house. And during our junior year, she said to me: I'm going on a 3 week church history trip this summer, you should come!

And so I went with her! And it was incredible. We laughed, we cried, we laughed some more, we almost peed our pants, we slept on top of each other on the bus, we danced in a Metro station in Washington DC, we took crazy pictures, we walked and walked and walked everywhere we went for 19 straight days in crazy heat and humidity, we saw America together AND WE LOVED IT. And each other. It was like, bestie status going on.

One night in our hotel, she said, "Amy, you are so pretty, I used to be so jealous of you!" and I said, "NO WAY! You are so pretty, I used to be jealous of YOU!!!!" It was the most tender of tender moments you could ever imagine.

Then senior year happened, and then college happened and we almost never got to see each other except about ONCE a YEAR because we were on different tracks. But even though we never hung out, we relied on our awesome memories and kept in touch by writing each other long emails. And then this thing happened, where Jessica decided to serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and she has been called to serve in ECUADOR!

When I was home for Christmas, Jess and I met up for lunch, and it was was one of those awesome lunch dates where you meet at a restaurant around lunch time and you leave around dinner time because you just can't stop talking. We talked for three hours at Panera and we could have talked for three more if our stupid lives weren't in the way. ha.



Shoutout to Jessica for being one of the spunkiest, bravest, most classy friends I've ever had. And thank you for being my friend despite my chronic uncoolness.