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The Rights and Perks of Being a Best Friend

• I get to be your sounding board.
• I get to hear about how things impact your day to day life — the things you like, the things you hate, the things that scare you. I get to offer you comfort and support on the less than awesome things. I get to offer you encouragement on things you’re hopeful about. I get to do happy dances with you when something awesome happens. These aren’t fake reactions. They’re the natural reaction to seeing what you’re going through.
• I get to tweet you with memes I know will perk you up, or post links to stuff I know you’re into on Facebook because I know that you’d be interested in it.
• I get to be enraged on your behalf. If your boss sucks, you might not get to talk trash about them, but that sure as hell won’t stop me.
• I get to piss off your family members, including siblings, in ways that you want to piss them off, but without the same kind of repercussions because they aren’t my family.
• I get to offer to throw things at other people on your behalf. You know I won’t actually do it, but I know that you perk up when I say I’m willing to do it anyway.
• When it comes to relationships and food, I get to overshare with you and you get to overshare with me because we’re weird like that.
• Speaking of food, I get to hold ice cream taste tests with you. And pizza. Ooh, and cheese. But wait…we’re both lactose intolerant.
• I get to hate your ex when he’s broken your heart. You don’t like it when I do, but I don’t have to like the person who makes you cry.
• I get to hate your ex even more when that broken heart means you don’t enjoy the things you used to do. I always want you to be happy, so if someone fucks that up, then they deserve my hatred.
• I get to be jealous of your new boyfriend when he spends more time with you than I do. I can’t help it, you’re awesome and I’m spoiled.
• I get to remember that time that you were on a break with your significant other and they were with another person, and I get to judge them for it even after you have forgiven them.
• I get to help you make playlists to play at the wedding that you imagine having with people you have crushes on or who you date. It may seem creepy or weird to others, but that’s just how we roll.
• I get to judge your spouse when they don’t do the laundry or they spend money on something that they didn’t need. I also get to judge your spouse’s family when they behave in an inappropriate way.
• I get to see you at your nerdiest, and you get to reciprocate by seeing me at my nerdiest. We can geek out together because best friends don’t judge about that sort of thing.
• I get to have chat and Twitter conversations with you that solely consist of sending one another GIFs or quotes from our favorite television shows & movies.
• I get to help you pick out makeup and clothes, and you know I’ll be totally honest about that — but not mean because we don’t do mean.
• I get to talk to you when you’re drunk and try to figure out what you’re talking about. I also get to joke with you about your drinking, but you know that if your drinking (or something you’ve said while drinking) ever concerned me I would tell you.
• I get to give you advice and then wonder why you would take it, because surely you’ve figured out that I’m not good at giving advice.
• I get to have the best friend a person could possibly ever have.

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