Best Friend Wish List

Small town life always seemed ordinary to me. I had lived in a town of less than 35,000 people since I was three years old. It was the only home I could remember. I had grown up with the same friends in school since Kindergarten, and I planned on finishing eighth grade with them.

The public school system in Alaska was not the best, and my parents wanted me to have a good education. Due to this, we planned on moving out of the state for high school. My mom and I were planning on moving and getting settled while I attended a private high school until my dad could find a job and move to where we were.

Then, out of the blue, during the winter of my seventh grade year, my father received a job offer in Seattle. I wasn’t expecting to leave so suddenly, but my parents assured me that it was for the best. My father accepted the offer and soon began his new job.

My mother and I prepared to join him after I completed seventh grade. The changed plans made me feel sick to my stomach. We weren’t supposed to move so soon. I thought I had one last year with my friends. I cried for weeks because I didn’t want to leave my home and my lifelong friends, and I didn’t think I would be able to make new friends.

My Wish List

My mom came in to talk to me one evening and I expressed how I felt. She told me that I should create a list of what qualities I wanted in a friend and ask God to bring a friend like that into my life in our new hometown.

That night we worked on the “Best Friend Wish List” together. I wrote many things, but mostly I wanted someone who had the same belief system as me, loved music, and was an only child like me.

The rest of the academic year passed by, and we moved halfway through the summer. The remaining weeks of summer proved uneventful and lonely. I was unable to make friends due to school not starting for another few weeks. I spent many nights crying alone in my room, hoping and praying that I would soon meet a new best friend.

New School

Once school started, I thought I would be excited, but I was consumed with fear. I entered into a room of 30 strangers–the largest class I had ever been in. Loneliness filled my first weeks, but I eventually made my first friend. She shared many of the same interests as me, and we had the same belief system. Over the next few months, I started building friendships with a lot of the people in my class, and I began to feel more comfortable.

Unfortunately, about halfway through the year, one of the more popular girls decided she didn’t like me. I was told by others that she felt that I was stealing her friends and used her popularity to turn people against me. This left me feeling as though I was on my own again, but my few remaining friends made sure I didn’t have to go through this alone.

I kept a low profile, and a few months later, the same girl who had previously despised me became an acquaintance of mine. In fact, by our sophomore year of high school, we were practically best friends.

College

Soon I was a senior, and another huge life move was on the horizon: college. The fear of going into a new school alone consumed me once again.

In the process of deciding where I should go, the memory of my “Best Friend Wish List” resurfaced. I then realized that God hadn’t just given me one best friend, He had provided me with a group of close friends. He provided friends that were an only child like me, friends with the same beliefs, and friends who loved music.

I am now a junior in college, and while I still see two of those friends fairly regularly, I am now closer with people that I met through those friends. God did more than help me to make the friends I needed when I began eighth grade. He used them to help me meet the friends I have today. I ended up getting all I wanted and more.

Makena Horton writes from the Pacific Northwest.

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