Lifestyle

Your Childhood Friendships Are The Best Friendships You'll Ever Have

by Alexia LaFata
Shutterstock

It was so easy to make friends as a kid, wasn't it?

All you had to do was share your favorite toy, live next door to each other, or sit near them during snack time -- and boom! You were best friends.

If only everything could still be that simple.

Despite the fact your relationships with your childhood best friends feel like they were based off little more than the fact someone wanted to play with that Buzz Lightyear action figure with you, these relationships are the most important ones you'll ever have.

They know you better than anyone else.

Your childhood friends know how you were as a child and how you are as an adult.

More importantly, they know you during that terrible, awkward and confusing period in which you were transitioning from that child to this adult.

Because of this, they've seen you at both your worst and your best. They've seen you struggle, grow and succeed, and they've seen the effort it took to get through each of these stages.

They know your history, and they know how it's molded you into the wonderful person you are today.

They know about the time you went bowling together as kids and cried because your parents didn't want to use bumpers, and you did.

They also know you've learned life doesn't come with bumpers, so now you enjoy bowling without them.

They can remind you of lessons you learned from mistakes you've made and experiences you've had that you may have forgotten as you've aged.

In this way, they're professionals at protecting you from doing anything you might regret.

They're the siblings you never had.

Just like you grow up with your siblings because you've known them forever, you grow up with your childhood friends because you've known them forever, too.

When it comes to your siblings, you don't hold back. If they look stupid in an outfit, if they said something rude, if they bowled an embarrassingly bad game, if you think their idea is bad -- you tell them.

Your honesty with your siblings knows no bounds.

And you employ this same kind of honesty with your childhood friends, too.

It doesn't matter how long you go without talking because you can always pick up where you left off.

Sometimes, life gets in the way of maintaining our relationships with our childhood friends.

Sure, you all grew up in the same town and went to the same middle school and high school, but then you all separated for college and jobs, got involved in romantic relationships, and moved away from the nest.

Even if you go forever without talking, it's so easy to get back in the swing of things.

A few years of silence can never erase a rich, lifelong history filled with silly inside jokes and ridiculous, adolescent debauchery.

They provide wonderful #TBT material, both literally and metaphorically.

What's a Thursday without a throwback? In the age of social media, Thursdays are the best days because you can post a picture of you and your friends in middle school wearing Juicy Couture sweatsuits and doing peace signs.

And it makes sense the best subjects of that photo are, well, the people with whom you attended middle school.

In a more metaphorical sense, your childhood friends are the perfect group of friends with whom you can reminisce about everything from your past -- even if it might've been mortifying at the time, it's hilarious now.

That #TBT middle school picture on Instagram will definitely spark a discussion in your group text thread about the time your social studies teacher walked in on you guys Googling "penis."

They're your second, third, and fourth homes when you go back to your hometown.

A visit to suburbia is incomplete without a visit to your childhood friends' homes to see their parents and pet their dogs.

Sure, your mom might cook a great pasta dish, but your childhood best friend's dad makes an incredible BBQ steak and tells the best stories about his time in law school.

No matter how old you are, the parents of childhood best friends welcome you into their homes and love you like you're one of their own.

It makes you feel like you never left town -- in a good way, of course.

You can do anything with them and have an amazing time.

When we were kids, our idea of a good time was different than it is now. Having fun with our friends meant riding bikes together, crafting fake food from Play-Doh, playing hide and seek, or going bowling.

But as we've all gotten older, our go-to activities have changed. Now, we get drinks together, go on lavish vacations together, and take cross-country road trips.

We've traded juice boxes for beers and pink bicycles for Honda Civics.

With your childhood friends, however, it doesn't matter what activity you do. You've already done all the "childish" stuff together, and you do all the adult stuff, too.

You don't care if you're 12 or 25. You had a blast bowling with your best friends from third grade, and you still have a blast bowling with your best friends from third grade because it allows you to reminisce and have fun with them. And you don't care who knows it.

Bowlmor is committed to giving Millennials opportunities to kick back, relax and have a hell of a time bowling with their best friends. After all, when you bowl more, you bond more.