Throwback Thursday: Hunting Island, 2003

Today’s throwback is over a decade old and is in honor of someone who has been a major part of my life for nearly two decades: the Bestie.

On the Beach with the Bestie at Hunting Island State Park. August 2003.

The Bestie and I have had a number of adventures over the years we have been friends, and this road trip adventure was to Hunting Island State Park in the low country of South Carolina. I can still remember the terrifying HoJo we stayed in and the monsoon we drove through to get there. I think I’ve mentioned it a time or two before, but this beach is one of my most favorite places in the world and this was the first time we both went there. It was right before the start of senior year of college… August 2003. A small group went and this was shot on old school film during a hot, but overcast day at the beach. Loved it.

Today’s throwback is in honor of the Bestie because today is a very important day: HER BIRTHDAY! Happy 32nd birthday to best adopted sister and best friend I could ever ask for. One of the awesome Christmas gifts she gave me this year was a charm of a compass… because we are lost without one another.I wear it around my neck most days.

We have been friends since we met in middle school back in the Fort and best friends since sometime in high school. Who knew all those lunch hours talking about what happened on Dawson’s Creek and Felicity the night before would lead to such a strong friendship years later? She taught me to drive, and drove my ass around until then. She stayed up on the phone with me every single night for three solid months in grad school while I cried myself to sleep as I felt my world was falling in around me. Her family welcomed me into their home when my own family was falling apart and made me one of theirs. She knows every single one of my deep secrets that I am terrified to tell anyone else. Everything I am embarrassed about, sad about or happy about… she knows. She has listened to me sing off-key and at the top of my lungs and happily gives me grief about it year after year. She can style my hair better than any stylist I’ve ever found. She puts up with my needing to eat at whatever place I “have to eat at” while I am visiting in the Fort… oh and she and her family let me stay with them every time I go home to visit. She knows that I read the last chapter of a book first to make sure no one dies, so whenever she gives me a book to read now she wraps paper around the last chapter so I can’t read it first. We both cry through Beaches and Steel Magnolias, but she can’t stand some of my favorite movies: Mama Mia and the Wizard of Oz. When it comes to shopping… the rule of thumb is if one of us loves it, the other would never wear it. We are opposite in so many ways and so similar in others.

At the same time. She lets me give her never-ending grief about that time we had to teach her how to make tuna salad (who doesn’t know how to make tuna salad?!). Her obsession with Heinz only ketchup, boy bands from the 1990s and the tv show Big Brother. Seriously, I don’t even follow Big Brother but I know when it is on and to not interrupt!

We’ve been each others’ rock through some good and bad times. We’ve had some pretty big fights and more hours chatting on the phone than I thought was possible. Oh, and she has been claiming she is turning 21 ever since her 22nd birthday. She is an amazing mother, wife, daughter and sister… and the best Besite that a girl could ask for.

Happy Birthday, Bestie!

And in honor of your LEGENDARY 21st birthday (the first and real one)… in the words of 50 cent “We gonna party like it’s your birthday. We gon’ sip Bacardi like it’s your birthday.”