What is a romantic friend? It’s hard to say. It’s hard to pin down the entire meaning of romance, even the meaning of “friend” is a bit hard to pin down, as both words mean different things to different people. To me, my romantic friend lights up my day just seeing that something from him has landed in my Inbox. My romantic friend remembers me from some of my most stupid and immature days in college, and still I seem to hold a special place in his heart. He holds a special place in my heart, my romantic friend. My romantic friend is now Dr Romantic Friend, teaching college in New York City, struggling along in the insanity of life like everyone else. My romantic friend and I still see eye to eye on a great deal, and surprisingly enough we’ve taken on some of the same harmless interests in life, like the same movies, feel the same oddball distance from normality that we shared in college. We both have seemed to hold on to our sense of humor, and I feel that that one item, more than anything else, is why I feel that this friend would qualify as a romantic friend. We love each other, although we’re both a long time married, him divorced once in a horrible fashion, and we love our spouses the way a person should love their spouses. But with each other we share something that our spouses can’t touch. We share history, we share some kind of common humble history with one another.


I accept his wife as readily as I would accept a new sister-in-law, and he accepts my husband in his manly way.... respect, appreciation for stealing my heart and making me feel loved in life. My romantic friend and I didn’t speak with each other for over ten years while we were getting on in life, moving on and moving forward and getting married, making careers. Neither of us stopped looking for the other however, once the internet came into being and into our homes. It’s just that we had no idea where to look, and we both had really common last names, and had no luck. But for years we still thought of each other, and hoped for the best.

Then one day we both got the same spam everyone else in the world must have gotten by now, one of those, “find your classmates” emails. I had looked around on there years previous, and they never let you go once you sign up. One day an email dropped in that had his name on it, and I choked down the fifteen dollars sign-up fee because I knew it had to be him. And I knew that at this time in my life what I really needed was an old friend. Someone to talk to. It was him, and we got in touch, started sending packages, and learned that our friendship never died. It just took a long weekend off. We fit each other like an old shoe, as the saying goes. Me and my romantic friend are back together talking about life and living like only old friends can. My romantic friend sent me an extra digital camera too, in the mail. What a treat. The best gift I’ve ever gotten. It was his reparations for me paying money for that god-awful classmates site.

There are few things in life for which I feel truly lucky. My romantic friend getting in touch with me is one of those things. We don’t email each other every day, not by a long shot. But when we drop a line it’s sincere, funny, and we enjoy each other’s company like old friends will. A romantic friend doesn’t have to be a love interest. A romantic friend just has to make you feel loved. Over and over again.