After a quality night of Hibachi and Italian Sodas, I surmised that your best friends from high school eventually fall into three categories:

1. Those who share a weaker bond with you than expected. You may exchange the occasional e-mail, but by year three you no longer speak and cannot still be considered friends.

2. Those you follow and talk with through year one. You steadily update each other with your state of the union, reflect on old times, and engage in decent conversation, but by year three you are different people, and the drifting apart slowly strains your bond.

3. Those you don't worry about continually updating, and no matter how little or often you talk while apart, you can still meet up, goof off in the car, and share an intimate talk with as if you've been in each other's lives everyday for the past few years. You have been a part of each other's lives this whole time. You hold a truly special friendship, one where you can envision playing catch with your friend's children while your wife laughs at how you two still act like kids from high school.

Tonight I sat across the table at Barnes and Noble from a dear friend who falls into the final category. Her name is Crystal. We shared one of those nights where we reaffirmed the legitimacy of our close friendship. We even taught each other a mutual lesson that applied to some of our shared dilemnas: you can only live in the present. We hugged and said goodnight, thanked each other for the wonderful night, and as I closed her car door, we quoted Zoolander and chuckled like kindergarteners.

Ah, bona note.