BFF

It's hard to appreciate the humor in this photo if you don't know these two kids. One of them, the short one (I say short, the kid standing next to him is 6'8 so all of us would be short standing next to him) is my oldest son, Tyler. The tall one is his best friend, Chris.

My husband and I were having dinner with our next door neighbors, while Chris and Tyler made the daily Saturday night rounds to the local Dairy Queen.

We did not see them before they left, Tyler sent me a text and said they were headed out, and would be back soon.

Here's where the humor is: They showed up at the neighbors to check in with us after going to Dairy Queen, looking exactly like they do in this photo (hence us taking photos.)

It was like they sent each other text messages and said, 'okay, lets go out tonight looking like we are fraternal twins and our mom never stopped letting us dress alike.'

Navy blue shirts (look closely, Tyler is wearing the famous weiner shirt), white shorts, hair, glasses...the biggest differences only being that Chris is a 12 inches taller and Tyler is 12 shades darker.

The best part? They had no idea that they had dressed that much alike, I mean truly had no idea, until they walked in the front door and had four adults staring at them, our mouths agape, all of us speechless for a second or two, before one of us finally asked if someone had forgotten to tell them Halloween was not until October. I can only imagine what the workers at DQ thought last night when those two came walking in for their Blizzards.

Good friends are priceless as an adult, I can say that as a mom. What would I do without my girlfriends?

But as a teenager, a true friend can help you try to make sense of things, during a time when nothing makes any sense at all.

A really good friend during high school can almost make or break a period of your life that, for whatever reason, as adults we seem to never be able to entirely let go of.

These two have stuck together, held each other accountable, raided my pantry and prayed together at my dinner table (unprompted by any adult.)

Teenagers are hard to raise. But knowing your teenager has good friends is half the battle. Actually, their friends are probably 75% of the battle. Finding your teen a good friend or three, and I mean the friends who will stick with them, and your battles will not be about who they are socializing with or what they are teaching them.

No, the battles you wage with the I'll-know-you-till-we-are-way-past-forty-friends will be more about whose house they've stayed at the most, and begging them to not consume the entire pantry in one night.

And if those are the worst of your teen battles, you'll know your kid has chosen good friends.

In about a month, Chris will be headed off to college, and Tyler will be forced to go through his last two years of high school without his 6'8 body guard to back him up.

I have no doubt we'll be making many trips to see Chris at college.

But in between now and then, we're having a talk about their wardrobe.

Seriously guys, is one of you color blind?