Here’s how it starts:

Make new friends, but keep the old — an old saying but a very familiar one that was often recited to Jordyn Patterson ’14, and Jessica Haroun ’14, in their kindergarten class.

The nursery rhyme has stuck with the two for as long as they can remember, and in just a few short months, that is exactly what they will have to do: make new friends as they enter college but keep the one “gold” friendship that has lasted throughout all of these years.

“I remember after our first ballet class when we were just four years old, Jordyn telling her mom that she and I were going to be best friends,” Haroun said. “It’s funny how she knew right then and there.”

At the end of second grade, Patterson had moved to London, which was a hard time for both of them.

“We practically did everything together, so it was definitely a weird transition from having play dates every Tuesday to only seeing each other over the holidays,” Patterson said.

They made it work, though. Over the six years they lived apart (before Patterson had moved back to the States) they wrote countless amounts of handwritten notes, emails, sent packages back and forth, and never failed to keep their connection strong.

“As for staying in touch next year, college will be a breeze,” Haroun said. “We’ve gotten pretty used to only seeing each other over the holidays. We did it once and we can most definitely do it again.”

Like Patterson and Haroun, Annie Raifaisen ’14 , Lauren Raifaisen ’14, and Emily Korn ’14 have been friends for over a decade.

The trio met through their mothers, who realized that they had incredibly similar families.

The families practically mirror each other:

-four daughters

-older sisters who are best friends

-same breed of dog (Wheaten Terrier)

-mothers with the same name (Sheri)

-birthdays a day apart (June 4th and June 5th)

-father’s names that rhyme (Barry and Gary)

The list goes on.

“Because of our families being so close, we get to spend even more time with each other than just normal friends would,” Raifaisen said.“It’s reassuring to know that even without us next year, they will still be close.”

From dance class, to sports, to days spent roaming the city, to endless times out to dinner and sleepovers, they could never get enough of each other.

“We’ve been inseparable since we were little girls,” Korn said. “My uncle, still to this day thinks that they’re my only two friends-that’s how often we’re together.”

They have already booked their flights to visit each other during the school year next year.

For Thomas Bonner ’14, and Kelly Gore ’14, their first interaction was on the school bus when they were in the first grade.

Bonner and Gore shyly sat across from each other.

“I always sat in the same bus seat every day, the one that had the word ‘poo’ graffitied on it in sharpie,” Gore said. “It amused me at the time, I guess, at least enough for me to refuse to sit elsewhere.”

Bonner simply did not understand why Gore wouldn’t give up her special seat, so he asked her and she responded with a sassy, “I don’t know!”

The two fought over the “poo” seat for the rest of the year, but the feuding led to friendship–eventually.

“Kelly is a part of my family. I just simply wouldn’t be who I am today if I didn’t have her by my side throughout all of these years,” Bonner said. “We currently live a minute’s drive away from each other. I can hardly imagine a plane ride away.”

They are both confident in their friendship lasting not only through college, but a lifetime, for they both help define who each other are today.

A circle is round, it has no end, that’s how long I want to be your friend —

That’s how it ends.