So I was watching Dateline tonight, which is something I try not to do because they're usually talking about murders and scams and when I used to watch it as a teenager I became exceedingly paranoid. I broke the habit of watching, and my paranoia has ebbed. Somewhat. But tonight I watched it because there was going to be a tidbit on Matt Le Blanc's show next season Joey.


I'm a Friends fan, and I don't care that a majority of my friends think it's a stupid show. It was special to me because no matter where I lived Friends was there. The year that I moved to four different states, lived in three different time zones and attended three different colleges, experienced 9/11, and dropped out of a dream: Friends was there. When I was 3000 miles from everyone who loved me: Friends was there. When I was growing up in the boonies and only had one friend and only one TV station came in on our fuzzy attenna, I grew up watching Friends and Seinfeld.


From the time my friend L and I were 12, we watched Friends. In 7th grade, her parents pulled her out of school and put her on homeschool, but every Thursday night, in between commercials for Friends and Seinfeld we called and laughed about how funny the show was or how stupid it was. We had this routine until we were 18 years old, and I moved across the country where Friends came on three hours before she got to watch. But we'd still call each other and talk about it. It's been a staple of our friendship. And now that the show is over, it's like the end of an era. And she and I have to grow up a little bit. We're both 22 years old (I'm exactly 31 days older) and married. She's been at a stable job for a phone company for the last four years, and I've been transferring schools and working on an English degree, which will culminate in an overrated graduation ceremony in just a matter of days.


So last night, I was glued to my television screen and crying. Not just for Friends but for what the show represented to me for the last 10 years. I've grown up a lot, and this show has been with me since I was 12. I can chronicle my life by the seasons. My parents' divorce was final during the first season. My dad got married to my step mom right around the time Rachel was dressin' up like Princess Bubbleyum at the end of Season Two. My mom got married during that summer and was going to forbid me to watch the show anymore. I convinced her to give the show a shot and when it came back she saw The One Where No One's Ready and we all laughed together. When Ross and Rachel broke up, for real, later that season, I was breaking up with two of my psuedo-friends from school who had tried to peer pressure me into watching Beavis and Butthead, and when I said that I didn't want to watch it, they told me to go fuck myself. As I cried for the breaking up of their relationship, I called L and cried about how awful every friend was except her.


Through leaving and moving and never being sure where home actually was... Friends always helped me feel like whatever state I haphazardly chose to inhabit was home.

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