11..., Lifestyle

11… Reasons I Have the Best Person Ever

Our first trip together! San Diego, 2014
We have a mutual love of bed and dogs. 2015
She’s smiling even though she was dying inside from the boredom that is carousels. My birthday, 2014.
She’ll take pictures like this with me! Christmas, 2019
The infamous Wox of Bine night, 2013.

11… Reasons I Have the Best Person Ever

This post is sponsored… kidding. This post was inspired by my best friend when I asked her what I should write about today, and she told me “11 reasons I have the best friend ever,” so here we are.  I changed it to “person” instead of friend because she’s more than my friend. She’s my sister, my partner, my soulmate, my other half, my forever and always, my constant. She is my person.

For those of you who don’t know her. Kelsey Roberts is a 25 year old bad-ass. We met seven years ago in college working at the library. She was a freshman; I was a senior. She just graduated from her Master’s program in Art History from George Mason University. 

  1. Kelsey has supported and loved me through some of the darkest times in my life. I really will never be able to thank her for everything she has been through with me, but it is a testament to our friendship and her heart that she is still around. 
  2. She’s fucking funny. We riff off of each other so well. We’re always in stitches when we’re around each other. I have so many screenshots of our conversations and an entire Google.doc of funny things we’ve said and come up with.
  3. She didn’t run away after the first time we hung out. Seriously though. There were a lot of red flags telling her torun, but she didn’t. She was like, “Yup! This crazy matches my crazy, and it’s scary but it’ll be fun.” It’s definitely been scary, but it’s been a hell of a lot of fun. 
  4. She’s just the right amount of stupid. Actually, she’s not stupid at all, but she is a hypochondriac. When her hypochondria gets-a-going, she’ll believe a lot of things. Like the fact she’s allergic to the color yellow so she can no longer eat bananas. That’s not a real thing, but she totally believed me until I posted the screenshots of that text exchange on Facebook.
  5. She puts up with me embarrassing her on social media. See #4 or writing about her on my blog or posting really embarrassing pictures from her drunken nights in college. (Which totally never happened. Kidding they absolutely did, and I was sober to capture her in all her glory.) Wox of Bine anyone? That’s Kelsey for “Box of Wine,” which she put on a short dude’s head so she could drink straight from the Wox of Bine’s spot. 
  6. We’re exactly the same height. Literally. Exactly. Except her mane gives her a quarter of an inch to a full inch depending on the day. We’re the same height, and it’s amazing. No awkward tall-short friend pictures for us. It’s a blessing. 
  7. She lived in DC for a few years. This was amazing for visiting purposes. I got to visit her and explore a really cool city!!!
  8. Her love for animals is as deep as mine. We’re crazy animal people. She leans more towards cats but has a never ending love for dogs too. She fully supported me when I told her I picked up Tess and was probably going to keep her and help her through the puppy-situation. Kelsey was the first person I called with Tess news. Kelsey knew before Dylan. 
  9. She gave me a family. Her parents are now my parents. Her siblings are now my siblings. I love them with all my heart. I lived with them for almost three years. I go home as much as I can, and they love me unconditionally. 
  10. She has a heart of gold. Truly, she would take away the world’s pain if she could. 
  11. She is my other half. We always tell people: If you love Kelsey, you’ll definitely love me. If you love me, you might love Kelsey. Kelsey is pricklier and harder to get to know on the surface. In reality, she’s more optimistic, positive, and open than I am. She seems more difficult to get to know, but she’s protecting her soft, puppy-loving, do-gooder heart from being hurt by shitty people because she has been through so much in her life. We are two sides of the same coin. We balance each other and make one another whole. She is the person I turn to and vice versa. We met and instantly became attached physically and emotionally. It got harder when I graduated, but we talk every day, all the time. And we talk about EVERYTHING. From poop to sex to fashion to dogs to health issues to politics to family to my existential crises/feelings of impending doom to her hypochondria and everything in between. Nothing is off limits. We have no secrets, and whatever hasn’t been shared is solely because we forgot or ran out of time or we’re waiting until the next time we see one another in person, which should be sooner rather than later. Since meeting her, I have never once been scared about being alone. I found my person at 22. My person is not a romantic love, but it is the best love in my life. There is nothing I wouldn’t do for her, and I miss her every moment we’re not together. Someday, I plan on kidnapping her and retiring to a lighthouse on the coast of Scotland where we will live together in peace raising dogs, cats, and White Park Cattle, while reading and writing about all the things we’re passionate about. 
  12. The one thing I don’t love: She hasn’t come to visit me in over three years. She needs to meet all her new fur nieces and nephews, see my new house, and sit on the couch and binge Netflix with me!!!

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Blog + Dog, In My Own Words, Lifestyle

Merry Christmas 2019

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Santa Beau in the house!!! | Santa Costume | Elf Jammies | Elf Hats |

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How we get dog pictures: BACON!

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Kelsey and I and Santa

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Opening Stockings

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My girl and I!

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Kelfey (Elf Kelsey) and her fur baby, Doodle!

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Jordan and her fur baby, Benny!

Merry Christmas!!! It’s my favorite holiday and the anniversary of this blog!!! 

I’m home in Illinois to celebrate the holidays with my family. They’re not my biological family, but they’re the family who chose me and who I chose. They are my best friend’s family. Kelsey is more than my best friend, she’s my sister. Her little sister [Jordan] is my little sister. Her big brother is my big brother. Her parents are Mom and Dad. I moved in with them five years ago after college. I didn’t [and they definitely did not] think I would live here for almost three years. Woops! Even after moving to Houston, I still go home for Christmas. This is the fifth Christmas I’ve spent at home – well, technically, the sixth holiday season. 

The first Christmas I lived here, I started a tradition, which is still going strong. I bought Kelsey, Jordan, and I matching Christmas pajamas. Every year, I buy us matching Christmas jammies. When we first started, it was just Kelsey, Jordan, and I. Now we each have fur babies of our own. 

This year, Kelsey sent me a text about a month and a half ago asking if Beau could be Santa for Christmas. I said, “ABSOLUTELY!!!” I suggested we be elves. I found us elf jammies and hats. Beau has her Santa costume. We had to take pictures because it’s too adorable not to. Anyways, yay Christmas!!!!

If you don’t celebrate, I hope you’re having an amazing day filled with love anyways! 

Merry Christmas from my family to yours! 

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

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In My Own Words, Lifestyle

Happy Birthday Kelsey

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December, 2018 at the Art Museum in Chicago.

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Baby Kelsey and RaeAnna in December, 2013.

There are people who make you. There are people who break you. There are a few who define you. There are even fewer you can’t imagine living without. There are maybe a handful of people who are all in for the good, the bad, the worse, the horrible, and the healing. Life is hard. Life is really hard, and mine has been a series of uphill battles. People have not been kind and because of that getting to know me is a battle in and of itself.

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San Diego. January, 2014. Our first trip together.

I met Kelsey almost six years ago. She was a freshman; I was a senior. I couldn’t tell you what it was about her. Probably a fuck ton of timing. I was raw and broken and alone. I needed a person, and so did she. We became pretty inseparable almost immediately. There’s no sex in this story but a lot of time laying in bed with pets watching stupid TV shows. We both have a deep love of bed, and I’m more comfortable lying in bed with her than anyone else.  

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The infamous. Wox of Bine night. 2013.

In a lot of ways, I found the greatest love story of my life.

Love is tricky even when life is easy. Love takes two parties – at least, it should. Even my dog and I have our ups and downs because we’re two different personalities trying to figure things out as we go. When people love people, well, that’s even harder. People talk. Beau vocalizes. At the end of the day, I feed Beau. Unlike Beau, Kelsey has a choice to be with me. She can feed herself. Also my baggage is pretty fucking heavy. Kelsey didn’t teach me love doesn’t have to be accompanied by bruises or conditions or violence or abuse. She did put love, the real kind, into action, though. She showed me kindness, compassion, respect without ever judging me or making me feel less than. I never saw fear or hatred or pity in her eyes. There was only ever love. Sometimes, sadness. When you love someone, pain is shared, and she has shared mine.  

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That time Kelsey said I could do heights and I about shit my pants. Spring Break, 2014.

I have made careers and relationships out of hiding who I am and being what other people want. My life for decades was based on pretending and hiding. Unconditional love was a theory; it belonged to other people. The lucky ones. For me, love was bought and sold and revoked. It was anything but free. I spent years searching and working and grasping at something that wasn’t even love to begin with. I put up with abuse and violence because “I love you” was whispered in there somewhere. All I had was words. Love isn’t a word; it’s a verb.

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Christmas, 2016. Snapchat filters.

Kelsey may be the only person in the entire world who truly loves me unconditionally. I am unfiltered and utterly me with her. I am never anything but me. Some days, I’m funny and loud and obnoxious and so embarrassing. Some days, I’m in a bad mood. Some days, I cry and cry and cry. Some days, I’m strong. Most days, I’m broken and a little bit of everything. I am quiet. I like quiet; though, most people wouldn’t know it. I talk and make jokes because people don’t ask questions when someone seems open. Kelsey is the only person who doesn’t ask if something’s wrong if I go without talking. She asks questions when I’m ready, but mostly she lets me tell her when I can. She doesn’t push. She respects who I am, no matter who that person is in the moment. Because she knows who I am and where I’ve been. More importantly, she never asks for more than I can give. She sees me and accepts me and doesn’t want anything else.

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That time we randomly went to Wisconsin for lunch. 2015.

There are things in my life I’m working through. Have been working through for a lot longer than Kelsey has been in my life. Six years ago, there was a massive upheaval of the few things and people keeping me sane. The first ounce of happiness and stability in my entire life was suddenly gone, and everything else started to disappear along with it. I lost so much so quickly. I was spiralling and raw in a way that I would really like to never be again. Because of that upheaval, I was able to be open with this random 18 year old. For some unknown reason, she didn’t say “Fuck this crazy.” Instead she dug in and dealt with problems no one should ever have to deal with.

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The cherry blossoms in D.C. 2018.

The good, the bad, the worse, the horrible, and the healing. Kelsey didn’t become my friend during the good. She hopped in at worse. Then, she watched me hit horrible and stay there for a long time before we got to healing. Maybe, she’ll get good one of these days. She didn’t put me back together again. She gave me a safe space to get it wrong over and over and over again. She continues to watch me put the same pieces together in different orders trying to figure out which way the belong. Hopefully someday, I’ll get it right.

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She supported me as I lectured at ISU.

Love stories are often between a boy and a girl who lock eyes across a room and just know. That’s great and all. (Other than being heteronormative. Girl and girl. Boy and boy. Fluid and queer. You do you!) I think some of the most important love stories in our lives are the ones that have nothing to do with sex. Platonic love is just as powerful, if not more so, than the romantic. I have loved men in an all consuming kind of way. They have shaped me, and some have even defined who I would become. No one has ever loved me the way my best friend has. We will never say vows or file taxes together or have children or any number of other quantifiers placed on a successful relationship. Instead, we choose to love each other’s crazy every goddamn day.

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Rooftop bar in Chicago. 2018

Kelsey isn’t perfect. She’s stubborn and picky and moody and a royal pain in my ass. She can be an absolute bitch sometimes. (I can say that because I’m her person. If anyone else calls her that, I will end them.) The thing is, she’s human. She is also kind and generous and smart and strong and patient and funny. She has seen hell and continues on. She is the greatest cat mom ever. Her love for Doodle makes mothers of humans question their love for their child. Kelsey is intensely everything I need in life. I can honestly tell you, there is a huge chance I would not be in this world if it weren’t for her. At the very least, without her, I would be in a very different place in my life, and it would not be better. She became my family and opened up her home to me. She is the person I talk to most. She knows just about everything there is to know about me. My world is better because she is in it.

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Drinks in New Orleans. 2016.

I need Kelsey in a way I will never need another person. She is my person, and I am hers.

Today is her birthday. I think I could probably write books about our relationship and what she means to me. I love her with all of my heart, and I have so much gratitude for everything she has done for me over the past six years. I refer to our friendship as a love story because it goes beyond friendship. It’s not just coffee or vacation. It’s a relationship. It’s a partnership. It is two people who have shaped and been shaped by one another. I wish I could be with her to celebrate today, but instead I will see her in a week and a half.

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Happy Birthday! Thank God the phone cameras have gotten better over the last six years.