Catching up

I spent a while last night catching up with my best man/best friend Ryley online. We chatted about various life subjects for quite a while until he vanished online and I decided to go to bed. It was a good talk and I’m lucky to have a friend like him.

Ryley and I became friends out junior year of High School in Geometry class. We were prime examples of students who were not let into honors classes due to politics. Basically, he and I sat in class and finished assignments in about ten minutes while the rest of the class struggled. When asked, “Steven and Ryley, shouldn’t you check over your work?” We’d respond, “No, we got a 100.” Ryley reminded me last night about how we used to blow the bell curve for the class so badly. A guy would be heading straight for a good solid B, maybe a B+, but due to our scores he’d end up with a C. Don’t get me wrong, this is just a regular class, so our academic feats are nothing to be amazed with, we were just two smart guys who should have been in honors and made the rest of the class pay dearly for it. Hell, Ryley started to take Calc at the local community college just so he could actually learn something.

So anyway, Ryley and I had a lot of spare time on our hands in that class and as odds would have it we became good friends. Our friendship was solidified for all time after the events of “Dan through the wall,” a defining moment in our high school careers. Ryley and I just sort of clicked and complimented each other. He was right, I was left. He lost his temper, I was a pretty laid back (albeit high strung) guy.

Anyway, it’s good to have a friend like him still in my life. Even though we live thousands of miles away we still manage to talk at least once a week. It’s not always the easiest thing to do, and there are times when communication got scarce, but we always managed to track each other down and without even trying we pick up where we left off.

I asked Ryley to be my best man a few weeks ago. Granted I did it in the cheesiest manner possible. I think the line was, “Oh yeah, by the way, would you be my best man?” I just sort of slipped it in at the end of some conversation. It was a losing predicament no matter how I asked, since Ryley would bust my balls anyway, so I just went with something just plain silly and played that card for him. A lot of what we talked about last night was things best man is supposed to be there for, thoughts about life, marriage, and the future in general. Most importantly though, what we talked about is stuff you can only talk about with your best friend, things you need honest answers and advice on, and I’m lucky that I have someone I can talk to like that.

Now, Ryley, when you read this, feel free to rag on me about it. It’s not meant to be a cush piece, just a retrospective.

-Steve