Payton Klaer

Throughout my life, I’ve moved more than the standard person, I’d imagine. I wasn’t in a new state every year and it wasn’t because of my parents’ jobs or anything like that. My family just took a long time to find where we belonged. When I was born (as the oldest), I lived in a tiny house in Mishawaka, Indiana with my mom and dad. It was just the three of us, plus a couple of dogs I barely remember. Then, we moved to a new place in Mishawaka – closer to my elementary school – and my younger sister came along. We lived in that house the longest, I think.

Then, we made the terrible move to South Bend, Indiana. Don’t get me wrong, South Bend itself was fine. The house was too big for the four of us. We were way too far away from my middle school and even further from my sister’s elementary school. Our friends never could come over because their parents didn’t want to drive them thirty minutes away. The house was in a gated community so almost no other kids lived in the neighborhood. Overall – it sucked. That’s when I started to lose my group of friends who I had been with for fifteen years. Fifteen years is a long time in terms of friends. Most of the girls I had hung out with I had known since before I could remember.

Right before I turned sixteen, my parents found a beautiful house on a lake in Michigan. It was a much better size for my family, the school was really good, and a ton of kids lived in the area. I was completely on board with the move – I needed a new start before high school. I had basically completely grown apart from my friends in Mishawak and life was just so lonely. My sister was very against it (I still think she’s upset about it sometimes even though it’s been six years) but we did it. We still live in Edwardsburg and it’s easily my favorite place we’ve ever been. I have a deeper connection with my friends from Edwardsburg than I ever had with my friends from Mishawaka.

Now, you’re probably saying: Payton, get on with it. You’re not even answering the prompt. And to that I say: Chill dude, I needed to lay some groundwork. Trust the process.

The moral of the story is that I’ve lost friends. I haven’t spoken with any of the eight girls, who I had sworn were my best friends for life, since we left Mishawaka.

Except for one. And that’s the one I’m going to talk about (finally!).

I’m not going to use her real name because, who would have thought, we ended up “reuniting” right back here at Indiana University. During our freshman year, she reached out to me after I had posted something on Instagram about going to IU, and we both were very surprised to learn she lived in the dorm right across the street from me. We had a nice little reunion, talked about Mishawaka, talked about my life in Michigan, talked about high school, talked about all of the things we used to do together, the list goes on. This was the girl who I had sleepovers with at the ripe age of five, and she was back in my life (emphasis on was).

It was wild to think that she was a completely different person. There was no way that could be true – I mean, I haven’t changed that much! I still watch YouTube as I go to sleep, I still love reading, and I still love video games. If I hadn’t changed, I thought she would be the same.

I’m sure you can guess that I was very wrong. We talked every once in a while during our freshman year. I almost ended up rooming with her in an apartment off-campus this year but it didn’t work out. Somehow our sophomore year, yet again, we ended up at the same apartment complex with her building right around the block from mine.

Crazy, right? You’re sure we stayed close? That we talked? Nope. I haven’t spoken to her since we moved in last August. And that’s only because she saw my parents helping me move in as she walked past my building.

I see her and her friends at every women’s basketball game. We have each other on BeReal. We live maybe thirty steps from one another. But she’s so different and I couldn’t even tell you how. She isn’t the same girl I grew up with.

But I think that’s okay. At the time, us growing apart hurt. Even if I had wanted to move, I still had lost my best friend – the only best friend I had ever had until that point. What I learned from her is that it’s okay to grow up. To grow apart. Because now, we are both living drastically different lives. She parties and studies in the business building and I watch movies with my roommates and march in the band. But even though we grew apart, I wouldn’t want to forget the friendship we once had. She’s the reason I love Kirby games (we completed Return to Dreamland in her basement with her older brother and that’s all I know about the franchise). She’s the reason I love Cheetos with my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. But she’s also the reason I am loud and outgoing and fun.

My takeaway from everything (and maybe yours too but I’m not your boss) is that it’s okay to change and to lose people along the way. You can still miss someone but feel okay with their absence.