You know how sometimes you've been friends with someone for a while, then you meet one

of their parents and suddenly everything snaps into focus.

You're like, oh, it all makes sense now.

This is why you are the way you are.

Well, let me tell you about my friend, Kirsten.

I'm a goofball?

Kirsten's your goofball.

I'm like that.

I met Kirsten in college.

We didn't go to the same school, but she was dating a friend of mine.

She's actually married to him now.

Kirsten is the kind of person everyone wants to talk to.

At parties, you got a kind of jockey for time with her.

She's a people-pleaser to the nth degree, listening to your problems without ever talking about

herself unless you ask.

What the most cursed anything about Kirsten is, she's got a talent for making everything

fun.

I once visited her at her college and we spent the day talking about boys, roller skating

around campus, who were the tennis courts, through the school library.

That night, we lay on her futon mattress and read to each other from Edgar Allen Poe's

The Raven.

It was like just a total magical day.

...