Misty water colored memories

My top two FAQs are:

1. Seriously, a youngish, Jewish Republican in New York City?
2. Seriously, Dawn Summers?

In honor of Dawn's 29th birthday (or the 4th anniversary of her 25th birthday, depending on how she's feeling), I thought I would share how I came to be stuck with the wacko liberal we all know and love. It will be 14 long years of knowing her come September.

Despite how it may seem, especially to people who know me personally, I was a painfully shy preteen. I hated speaking and would talk super fast to get all the words out and away from me. I was extremely sulky and self concious.

My parent's friend's kid had not gotten into a private high school in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn so my parents, of course, made me apply. They promised me a guitar if I got in. I got in. The guitar was not worth it.

It was my first week of high school. I hated it violently. I didn't talk to anyone in my classes, except when one girl asked me why I never wear any clothes from the Gap (I asked my father that weekend why we never went to the Gap. He said 'what did we forget there?'). I was on the school bus on about day 4 and there was this rowdy black girl with 5000 teeth that she flashed every time she smiled or laughed (which was all the damn time). I was totally fooled by the smile and went out on a limb and decided to talk to her. It went like this:

Me: Can I borrow your walkman?
Her (rolling her eyes in a way only she can): If I had a walkman, wouldn't I be listening to it?
Me: Oh.

I didn't talk to her, or really anyone, for awhile after that. Then, on some whim I still don't understand, I joined the Model U.N. team at my school. Dawn was also on the team (and in every other club and team at the school. Her stated goal was to have as many photos in the yearbook as possible.) We were going to participate in a Model U.N happening at Yale University in New Haven. Somewhere on that trip, Dawn and I discovered that we both watched 'Days Of Our Lives'. A friendship based on a shared love of a Soap Opera was beginning. She told me she had enough money to eat only candy bars the whole time we were away. I remember feeling really bad for her and worrying about her. Also on that trip, sophmore in high school Dawn said 'I'm going to go to Yale for college'. She did.

We started spending hours on the phone together. Even when I left the evil school after a year, our phone calls continued. I would read her the entirety of 'Soap Opera Digest'. We had the same sarcastic sense of humor. We would laugh not only at other's misfortunes but also at our own. We weren't sappy girls writing BFF all over our notebooks. We were a lot realer.

Dawn was a year above me in school and I cried when she went away to college. I was making her a tape to take with her and just started bawling. My mom thought someone had died.

We've taken breaks from our friendship over the years but always seem to come back, lured by the hilarious marathon phone calls that we can have with no one else.

When my grandmother died earlier this year, instead of asking me how I was doing in a faux sad voice like a lot of other people did, Dawn said 'oh, you're going to be really sad, aren't you?' When my other grandmother died about a month ago (it's been a bad year), Dawn sent me gorgeous flowers with a note that read 'I'm sorry you don't have anymore grandmas'. We enjoy sticking annoying songs in each other's heads and waking each other up. It's not a typical friendship, in fact we deny that we're friends at all. Everyone knows how mismatched our politics are, but I can't say it's ever affected our friendship (except maybe for a little while right after the 2000 election where our emails bordered on real meanness instead of the kind we usually share). Even aside from politics, we have very little in common. It doesn't seem to matter though, we laugh at the same dumb stuff and have a level of comfort with each other that makes it one of the best friendships I have (and I have the best friends ever as it is). So, happy birthday Dawn (btw, your present is all the links in this piece, enjoy), I look forward to another 14 years as a member of the boring team (as my mother calls us when she catches us on the phone). Go on over to Clarified and wish our Dawn a happy birthday.