Friends part 3 of 7

Teenage life ebbed and flowed depending on the agenda of my friends.

School attendance ebbed and flowed depending on the schedules of my friends.

Rules were kept and broken depending on the goals of my friends.

Alright angry girl-wind yer neck in will you?  I think this photo is hilarious and makes me feel utterly ridiculous!

You get the idea.

Ok wait,  I'll revise that....

I mean we've all heard it "if your friends asked you to jump off of a bridge would you do it?"  

Maybe not, but back then I'd likely have walked to the bridge taken any suggested detour and spent an awfully long time debating with them about it as we stood together at the edge.

If I were to chronicle the most reckless periods of my teenage years the chapters could easily be given the name of a girl.  A like minded, lost and equally up for it girl.  Like magnets we would find each other and then the adventure would begin.  

My friends were more important to me than my family.....by far.

I had friends I would fight with just as hard as I'd fight for, a strange sisterly, love-hate loyalty, a twisted kind of false loyalty.

Sisterly in all the ways except lasting.  

Soon we'd part ways for whatever reason.  

The periods of chaos would temporarily give way to another attempt at settling in the current home situation.  I was less talented finding mischief alone, maybe they were too.  I'd try my  hand at school attendance, coming home at night you know all the good stuff.

One of the High School's I attended 

I hope I was never a bully, but I think I could certainly be brash.  At school that is, not so much in other circles.  I was aware of my place in the pecking order and in some circles, it was good to know your place.

Sometimes I used my brashness to be a defender too, but just as the fancy took me, I couldn't be relied on to always help you out.

I had no idea who I was, I was lost.

But the pattern continued and it was as if I'd pick up where I left off, dropping in and out of groups previously known and unknown.  Stability of a sort, to instability.  Back and forth, back and forth.  With each relapse an upping of the ante.

I wonder how this would have played out had it not been abruptly halted by a final and secure home and of course the church which changed it all and finally broke the cycle.

At church I would find a different kind of friend all together....