Today, one of my best friends sent me this message while I was talking to her and just being my usual strange self. It inspired me to write about what my friendships mean to me and how I got them.

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For most of my life, I tried to lay low and fit into little boxes. I wanted people to like me so much. I was already ostracized for my hair color, my weird quirks certainly weren't going to help matters. I also spent most of my young life getting the shit kicked out of me by boys AND girls alike. In fact, I have a hunk missing out of one leg, and a broken pencil lead in another to this day.

One year, enough was enough, I started really fighting back, breaking a couple noses. I was then bullied from a distance, but still bullied.

It was at that moment that I realized that no matter what I did, someone out there wasn't going to like me. Someone was going to have something nasty to say, someone was going to come after me. I spent so many wasted years trying to fit in and win approval from all the wrong people. The only person I needed approval from, ultimately, was myself.

Once I realized that, once I dropped the facade, my people found me. Or I found them. Or a friend of a friend paired us together.

"You're fucking weird... I know someone you will LOVE."

Instead of being frightened, I went out there, grabbed societal standards by the nuts, and made it my bitch. I talked to people openly, I communicated, I disagreed. I let my outside match my inside. I wore broomstick skirts and corsets out in public, I grew my blazing red hair to my ass, I went to local rock shows. I entered a male dominated field and made sexist jokes right back when I was mocked.

I got into an art school (which was like being in a damn episode of FAME every day. It was magical.). I didn't fear being called a nerd, and read my Shakespeare/E.E. Cummings collection openly. I took my AP Honors English classes and wrote my thesis on Anne Rice. I talked scifi, played YuGiOh, and I danced when I was happy. I came out about being bisexual, I embraced my sexual and emotional desires, and I treated everyone with the kind of love I wanted.

I was MYSELF. By embracing who I was as a person, not only did I gain better perspective into what I needed, but also WHO I needed around me.

Thanks to all the trials and tribulations, the heartbreak, the ass kickings, the pain... I have people in my life that love me for the person I am and not who I could pretend to be. They know all of me, every little bit. I'm that friend that they warn their other friend's about before they meet me, because something inappropriate may come tumbling out.

"Nikki, talking to you is like reading a book with no cover or watching a movie without a preview. I have no fucking idea what to expect."

And that isn't a bad thing to them.

These friendships forged in fire mean everything to me, and I hold them close to my heart. Knowing that I am so accepted and loved, the way that I accept and love them gives my life something it had lacked for so long as a child.

Unconditional, unyielding, unwavering love.

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Stand up. Be yourself. Let your freak flag fly. Your people are out there waiting for you.

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