How to Celebrate a “Friend-a-Versary” (You Know, Like an Anniversary, Except with People You Don’t Smooch)

I’m a big ol’ fan of celebrations: parties, holidays, the “happy dance” that I perform in my room after I do my laundry and realize that I don’t have to wear ratty underpants anymore.  It doesn’t take much for me to throw my arms up in the air, and praise the skies that “life is good” (and consume a celebratory milkshake or margarita along with it).  I am constantly looking for excuses to celebrate something, anything.  For this reason, recently proposed that my friends Heather, Christine, and I celebrate the one year anniversary of our friendship, or our Friend-a-Versary.

I have been friends with Heather for longer, but the first time that I met Christine was at a joint birthday party for Heather and Christine’s roommate, Mike.  That initial meeting was overshadowed by a wild dance floor display by two other party attendees: a 6’4”, bearded manly-man dry-humping my collegiate cousin from behind, all while lifting his arms to the sides of his face in a sort of “driving a low-rider” motion.  Christine, Heather and I all found that scene hilarious, but our friendship didn’t truly blossom until later, when we bonded over shared loves of tacos, cats, and tacos.  One year later, we’re still petting cats and stuffing our faces.  Question: can you think of a better reason to celebrate a friendship?  Answer: there isn’t one.  The Friend-a-Versary was on.

There are many ways that one can celebrate a Friend-a-Versary, but Christine, Heather and I chose to do it with spoken word.  That’s right, despite the fact that none of us are poetesses, we decided to write “friendship poems” to each other, embarrass ourselves by reciting them, and hopefully not get so in-the-slam-poetry-zone that we spit when we talked or gesticulated over-dramatically (this was a major fear of mine, because I still have PTSD from the time I got waaayy too into my 8th grade Spanish class play, Episode of TRL, in which I played Britney Spears and started dancing and singing with my eyes closed during my solo performance of “Uups… lo hize otra vez”).  Heather and I are slackers and kind of half-assed the poems, but it turns out that Christine is like the Allen Ginsberg of poetry about girl friendships and tacos.  Here are some excerpts from her friendship poems for Heather and me:

Long brown hair,
Pork burrito, please.   
Extra jalapenos, hold the cheese.

************************************
Carrie, carry on
With your rice and beans,
And orthopedics in step.
The sound of chewing tortilla flesh.

Like I said, we love Mexican food to the grossest degree possible.  All-in-all, our Friend-a-Versary was a super fun, completely FREE celebration-for-absolutely-no-reason, and I highly encourage you and your friends to get down like clowns and Friend-a-Versary it up, as well.  If friendship poetry about masticating flour tortillas isn’t your thing, there are other cheap and FREE that ways you can pay homage to your posse, as well.  Here are some ideas, off the top of my head:

1) Signature Friendship Cocktail/ Cookie/ Pizza:  Put your noggins together and come up with some sort of recipe that incorporates each friend’s individual tastes.  For example, if Christine, Heather and I were to concoct a pizza recipe, it would probably be a gluten-free pie topped with Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes from Taco Bell, Avocado, chocolate chips, and drizzled with Cholula.  Oh god, on second thought, don’t do this unless you want insane tummy troubles afterward.  That can’t be fun to digest.

2) Friend-a-Versary Clothing Swap:  I know, I know– I, too, would like to Freaky Friday with my gal pals just so I can live a day of having bigger tits and stuff.  But unfortunately (or, fortunately?) transforming into Jamie Lee Curtis just isn’t possible IRL.  The second best thing is a Friend-a-Versary clothing swap, in which you bring those Farmer John overalls that you just don’t bust out anymore, and trade them for your BFF’s neon yellow clogs that are so second grade substitute teacher (in the most stylish way possible, of course).  If you can’t be your favorite friend, you might as well dress like him or her.

3) Spirit of Friendship Obstacle Course:  Throughout high school, I was Secretary of a club that was similar to Big Brothers/Big Sisters.  One year, my friend Ashley and I thought that the best way to celebrate the friendships created by the organization would be to challenge the other high schools in the area to a ridiculous obstacle course that we were sure we would win.  Winners got to throw water balloons at the losers from point blank range.  Well, thanks to a member of our team not being able to swallow a fistful of saltine crackers and subsequently blow a chewing gum bubble fast enough, we actually lost and received the watery assassination.  Point is, you should try this with your friends.   Nothing spells “F-R-I-E-N-D-S-H-I-P” like being viciously pelted with water bombs by underprivileged youth, ya know?

Celebrations are the best, so why don’t we turn every task into a special occasion?  From doing the no-more-ratties dance, to toasting the bond you have with your closest buddies, anything can be turned into an excuse to party (or write taco-centric spoken word to each other).  So, start with the Friend-a-Versary– just because you aren’t boning someone doesn’t mean you shouldn’t celebrate the love you have for each other!

Photo credit:  folkinz