Let me tell you about my best friend

From the very moment that I met my little guy we were instantly connected. Bentley was more than just a dog, more than just a pet. He was my family and my child. Some people don’t comprehend how attached one can be to a pet, but Bentley was not a puppy to me, he truly was the equivalent to being my human child and I loved him more than anything else in the entire world. There is a reason dogs are referred to as man’s best friend. He was mine.

Here is the story of me and my darling baby Bentley Boo (yes that is his middle name). When I first graduated from grad school, I moved back to Tahlequah to take an adjunct teaching position at NSU. The problem was, it was September and the semester I would begin teaching wasn’t until January, so I went ahead and went back so I could get settled and knew I would need another job anyway, so figured I could go ahead and get a head start on the process. So I stayed with my sister Marissa for a little bit while I looked for my own place. 

 

The first night I got to her house I happened to see this little black and white fur ball sitting on the ground curled up in a blanket next to the couch. I immediately picked him up and asked her how long she had had him and where she got him from. She told me at the time that she had only had him a couple of weeks that his name was Harley and she found him in the Wal-Mart parking lot (by found she meant purchased). He was the absolute cutest thing I had ever seen. 

 

I began working at my old college job, which was where my sister worked too, but she was working nights and I was working days. At night when I would come home I would pick him up and take him to bed with me. Marissa had other dogs, but he was the one I liked. He was teeny tiny, fluffy and snuggley…which is 100% right up my ally. After staying with Marissa for a few weeks I finally found a house, but was sad that I was going to have to leave my new fur ball friend. 

In the few weeks of staying with her I had also changed Harley’s name to Bentley, because he just didn’t look like a Harley to me (it was between Sloan, Armani and Bentley, unless you're Corey, in which case his name has always been Spartacus…obviously however, Bentley won). I think Marissa got that he was my puppy soul mate so she told me to go ahead and take my dog. MY DOG, he was mine, my very first and I loved him. See Bentley and I didn’t just happen to come together…he picked me and clearly loved me the most. I was his mommy and his person.

My little Boo Boo Bear and I moved out and settled in at our new home. Over the next four years my baby boy became my life. He was the greatest comfort to me when my mom died, and made it possible for me to get through that juncture in my life. He would be so excited when I would come home and would not stop his excitement until I would pick him up and kiss him on his head and tell him how much I had missed him while I had been gone that day. Bentley would sleep right next to me every single night and cuddle up with me on the sofa on the weekends. He made me feel like I was his entire world and it was the best feeling to know that something out there truly loved me that much. 

People made jokes about how ridiculous I was with my dog, but they just didn’t understand that he was my heart. I didn’t consider him a dog at all. I considered him a person, which in retrospect means that he too considered himself a person, which wasn’t necessarily appreciated by all. When I was away from him he would have separation anxiety and when I was away from him I couldn’t sleep because I was so use to having him next to me. As much as he missed me while I was away, I am sure that I missed him just as much.

This last year when I moved away from the majority of my friends, family and support systems to take my current job in Norman I was very lonely, but I still had Boo Boo to come home to. When I was sad he made me happy, when I was mad he brought me joy and when I was happy and everything was going just fine, he made everything that much better. 

 

I will miss greeting him at the door, taking road trips with my little guy...who was the best thing in the world in a car. I will miss his puppy kisses and how he would hold his toys in his hands like a little person. I will miss how he would just run run run in circles; out of nowhere he would get these little hyper puppy streaks and then stop and cough like a fat kid (hahahaha….so funny and so true), I miss his floppy little ears and how he would stand behind me when he was scared because he knew his mommy would protect him. I miss him letting me know that it’s bed time. I miss having to pick my pillows up off the ground because he for some reason did not believe anyone should have a bed made. I miss how proud he would look when I would tell him how good he was. I miss him being my shadow and how he would follow me around all morning while I was getting ready for work. I miss how annoyed he would look when my alarm would go off and he wasn't ready to get up or how he was a diva dog abut the rain and the snow and looked at me like I was crazy for thinking he should be exposed to such mistreatment. I miss how he would let me just hold him like a baby and would fall asleep with his head on my shoulder. I miss his hugs and kisses and the way he would snuggle with me at night (and really all the time), but most of all I miss his 100% unconditional love and the fulfillment he brought to my heart, which is now broken into a million pieces. 

I don’t know that anything else in the world will ever bring me that much joy, but I am beyond grateful for the love that he gave me for his short little time here on this earth. It was just me and Bentley and that was all I needed. He was my happy and I was his.

This is the very first day I met him and I knew I loved him then.

I love you my little Boo Boo Bear…until we meet again, I am sure you are in heaven being taken care of by my mommy, and she will love you every little bit as much as me. 

Bentley Boo Brubaker 

June 21, 2011 – August 6, 2015

I'll be there for you

So I was advised that this week was "Bestie Week", now I'm not going to research this and find out if that is true or not, but in the interest of transparency I thought I would go ahead and let you know. I also do not feel that a specific week needs to be set aside that one needs to realize and recognize that their "person" is important to them. So with that being said, I believe we should recognize every day as bestie day!

Now that I have gotten that out of the way, I want to talk about friendships today and why each one of them is so imperative to our existence. I want to talk about why it is necessary to have people in our lives and why being a "best friend whore" is important (yes Amanda...that one is for you). So lets get to it!

Not every person is brought into your life for a reason, but every person you choose to remain in it has a purpose. This is because these people bring something out in you or fill some kind of void, thus making them a requirement in your life.

One of the biggest mistakes I think people make when talking about their friends is assigning one of them as their "best friend" and the rest are just "friends", making them sound like they are less important and they aren't...no friend would make another friend feel that way. Look at "Sex and the City", who would you say was Carrie's BFF? You can't because she has three! See it's alright to have more than one because people need people!

This year I took a new job, away from all my peeps and the ones that were closer (in proximity), weren't super close and I knew that realistically I would never see them because they are living their own lives and let me tell you what, I felt super lonely. I would spend a majority of my days (when not at work) alone in my apartment (I shouldn't say alone...I had my dog Bentley), but I was lacking human interaction. It was depressing and not a way that one should live their life. I made friends, and from time to time I would get to see my old friends. The phone became my most important accessory...I would talk and text ALL THE TIME. Not that I didn't do that before, but the phone became my lifeline. The fact is people need people because without them...I was a big hot mess in a very dark and twisty kind of place. No bueno!

This is where I will explain why being a "best friend whore" is important. You have to have more than one friend...you should have many full of great quality, not many for the purpose of having great quantity. There are people we meet that it feels like we have known our entire lives, others who immediately you just click with because they get you or think just like you. Some friends are your polar opposite and expose you to things you never would do on your own, therefore making you a more well rounded person. There are friends you go to when you are in desperate need for a good time and others you go to when you are in desperate need of a good cry. Some friends you can go months without speaking to and pick right back up where you left off like no time has passed at all. Some friends you have to talk to every day or it just feels off. Some friends are your girls, some are your guys, some are your sisters or brothers, aunts or mom.

I like to categorize mine with different BFF names. If you are given a nickname by me, that automatically means that I consider you one of my besties. So you are either your nickname (Code for best friend), my person, my bestie, my bff, my sister, my bestie guy friend, my bestie girl friend, my Mommy, my girl, my guy, Handsome, Mixty, Beck, Palin, Terrence, Sis, Sib, Biggy, Trystle, niece, Little Linda, Fry Rye, Little one, Boo Boo, Boo Boo Panda Bear, Kare Bear, Katerax, Joshy, kiddo, pisshole, koala bear, my motherf'ing scientist, c-lowe, my jew, cuz, Jay-Z, honey, honey bunches, rooms, rommie, etc... If your name is shortened and I call you by your full name that's a good sign that you are one of my besties, If I've shortened your name and call you by your first initial, if I have ever been in your wedding party (or if you are planning on me being...yeah I'm working on my 27 Dresses status). Really if I call you by any term of endearment really then you are probably on my VIP BFF list.  I am sure I have left people off, but I hope that if you are one of my BFF's then you know it already.

So regardless of whether or not it is in fact Bestie Week...call, text, or remind the people that you love that you can't imagine a world without them. Celebrate Bestie week...this week and every other one to follow!

Love Always,

Cassandra B.

“The Other C.B.”

Dirty Little Secret

Conflicting messages are what we are all being bombarded with when it comes to today’s entertainment industry. Film is an art form and art is supposed to reflect real life. Screenwriters and authors write stories, which most times are not entirely fictional, even if that is the genre. Most of these “stories” have a hint or more of a personal life occurrence that the writer or someone they know has experienced. So the age old question remains, does art imitate life or does life imitate art?

I have been watching a lot of Sex and the City lately, so please forgive me for the examples that will be used, but on a complete side note I only have one more season to go before I can say that I have seen the entire series…yay for me…finishing what I start…lol. Now back to my point.

Cheating is wrong. Obviously! Right? 

Every movie or show we watch proves this fact, or does it? 

In some scenarios it does. Take Tyler Perry’s movie “Temptation” for example. This beautiful, smart, successful, happily married woman who has a wonderful adoring husband decides to cheat on him with a more “successful” man. Due to her actions the cheatee ends up being a crazy HIV infected abusive a-hole and the aforementioned adulterating woman ends up alone with the HIV. This is clearly an extreme example of how cheating is portrayed as wrong, now let’s look at the alternative.

 

Grey’s Anatomy, Friends, Gossip Girl and Sex and the City, what do all of these shows have in common other than the fact that I love them all? Cheating, that’s what! 

Interesting twist, they each offer cheating that is completely understandable and even justifiable. Allow me to explain.

Each heroine from these shows has found herself in this situation. After years of building a back and forth relationship with the woman’s “soulmate”, each woman is put in some kind of cheating situation, but as viewers we don’t even get mad at them for this. Why? Cheating is wrong, right?

Meredith becomes the “dirty mistress” in her steaming love affair with a married McDreamy, but when his wife Addison cheated on him with the oh so hot Dr. Sloan she was definitely in the wrong, no question about that. However, when Mer and Derrick do it, as an audience we wanted them to, we expected it. It had to happen for the show to go on.

The “we were on a break” story line from Friends. Ross cheats on Rachel and we hate him for it. Rachel constantly gets in the way of him and his relationships by making Ross cheat (not necessarily with sex, but emotional cheating occurs for sure) and we get it. It doesn’t even come up on our radar that she is the other woman because how can she be the “other” when we know she is the “one”?

Gossip Girl character Blair Waldorf finds herself in a crazy love triangle between her Parisian prince and her beloved Chuck Bass. Before we know that the prince is a putz we empathize with him as a viewer, but ultimately struggle with the back and forth relationship of Chuck and Blair for all six seasons of the show. Cheating is just anecdotal drama needed for the show. We know Chuck and Blair will be together because they have to be.

Then of course there is the Big mistake made by Carrie Bradshaw on Sex and the City. The Big affair. This is when Carrie is dating the perfect boyfriend one could ask for Aiden, but somehow still ends up hooking up with her ex manfriend Mr. Big who is married to a twenty-something year old named Natasha. Viewers were pissed-ish at Carrie for doing this, but not long enough to hate her because we understood that it was a force of nature that drew her into the arms of Mr. Big and that my friends is what we refer to as fate.  

These characters that we have emotionally invested in and see so much of ourselves in, make this horrendous mistake and we forgive them because we know they were unexplainably drawn to this other person, so in actuality it wasn’t their fault. They had to either cheat on or cheat with to get their man back, right?! 

Do we believe this to be true in our own lives? These plot lines do not try to justify whoring around, but to be the cheater or the cheatee with that one special person…is that OK? Do we have one free pass if it is our great love and if so will this keep us from the damnation and judgment of others?

So ladies and gentleman, the question on the table today is…do you think it is OK to cheat if and only if it is for the sole purpose in completing our life’s story? Is it ever justifiable to partake in this specific act of defiance?  

Obviously if you cheat you will not necessarily end up with AIDS and death (but you may). 

Is it possible that we know we are chasing after our soul mate when we do cheat? How do we know that this particular individual is our special someone?

The problem is the media has blurred the lines between right and wrong, what some see as black and white can also be seen through shades of grey. 

We love Meredith Grey, Rachel Green, Blair Waldorf and Carrie Bradshaw, we as women see ourselves in them. So is it alright if our Derrick, Ross, Chuck or Mr. Big are currently with someone else that we try to get them back. Is the flirting, tempting and emotional relationship on the side acceptable? Is this cheating different from other circumstances of adultery? Would we even define what we are doing as cheating?

There is no denying that there are certain people in this world that we are drawn to without any explanation. The very essence of their being somehow completes and consumes us. We have had this man in our lives in some kind of capacity for some time, so there is now history there, which only further affirms our notion of purposeful passion and dare I say it, true love.  

If we find that they are somehow in a relationship with another woman, is it reasonable for us to take matters into our own hands and still have a relationship with this man? Is it alright if we are doing it for the sake of “true love” or because we are “supposed to end up with them?”

We are the lead woman, and the heroine of the story of our life, so I believe we make sense of it to others and to ourselves because it has made sense in the aforementioned situations. We are not the type of women who would cheat, but many find that they are the type that will push limits and bend rules to get the man that they are destined to be with back, but how do we know that he is that man?

I ask these questions and pass no judgment, but I would love to hear your responses. I myself have found myself in some questionable situations at times, so I assure that calling you out for your answers, whichever way you believe is not my intention. I simply would love to hear your thoughts on the topic. Just some food for thought, until next time…

Love Always,

Cassandra B.

“The Other C.B.”