For Ted

There are friends we see every day.  Friends we only know online.  Those who knew us when and will know us again.  There are souls we seek and souls we find.  There are smiles we cannot live without and smiles that come across the miles.  Inside jokes shared with faraway blokes.

And then there are those who knew us when, who live in our minds and are carried in our hearts.  Friends who climbed trees, who ran and laughed and skidded his bike right across your first dozen years.  Hide and seek until your fifteen?  Christmas carols until your voice broke?   

Bike paths drawn with dry wall chunks, baseball games on the tv and do-overs and interferences.  Pickles and fried bologna sandwiches.  Life's curveballs and dramas.  Teenage angst. 

And then the do-overs and the interferences again... only this time on a whole other plane.

The friends who knew you when, the ones who stumble around our memories again and again.  The ones who shape the choices we make, who we remember with a smile. 

And if it is up to me... these friends will know one another again.