Hubberts = Home

A long time ago, I took a big plane over a huge ocean to a gigantic city in a tiny country on a small island. That's where I met the Hubbert twins: Cassie and Sally. Actually, that's not true at all, they're triplets, but I really doubted Molly's existence for a long time, so they're still sort of twins in my head.

But I digress.

We spent a blissful summer in London together, eating hummus and baking horrible British-ingredient-based-treats and going to the park for walks and talks in the evening. We celebrated 21st birthdays at the Texas Embassy and were robbed of our unmentionables and played charades in the street and lived in a three-story flat with five other girls and fell in love with swiss tennis players. Wait, that was just me.

We lost our youths that summer. Actually, that's not true at all, either. We were pretty well-behaved save a few nights spent at the local Westbury.

But then, as is the case with all good things, summer was over. London got even colder, and it was time for us to leave. We went our separate ways: they, to the south, me, to the north.

But then, as is sometimes the case when you are very lucky, we were given a second chance.

We graduated college and they lived in Tulsa and I moved to Dallas and they came home to Texas for holidays and I went up to their house for holidays and then Sally moved to Indiana for grad school and I moved to Indiana for grad school and Cassie moved to Dallas to join the real world and our lives flip-flopped just a little and now we get to run into each not as often as we'd like, but at least often enough that we are happy. And that's partly true, because Cassie's far, far away, but I am moving three doors down from Sally.

And the angels rejoiced!

Here we all are at 21, just babies.

And 22ish.

And here we are again, at 23.

And yesterday, they turned 24.

I am thankful to have memories with both girls -namely the holidays spent at their house with the rest of their family - and separate memories with each of them - celebrating my 24th birthday at Medieval Times with Cassie and the Summer of Bad Decisions with Sally. They are both the warmest, kindest, most hospitable people you'll meet. I've been in town for less than a week and I've already eaten more of Sally's food than my own, borrowed her clothes, and spent as many nights at her place as mine.

The Hubberts are home to me. Wherever we are, as long as we're together, I'm happy. Their house in Texas became my home.

Their friends became my friends.

And once I marry their brother, we'll be even more like family than we already are.

But I doubt I'll be able to love them any more than I already do.

Happy birthday, my Texas girls! Here's to many, many more years of baking and eating together.