The best gift

Greetings, I am joaj34, and this is my first post on KTL's blog. You can check me out here. I had been wondering what to share with the KTL world, but the answer hit me last night when i found out what KTL himself had been up to.

As some of you may know, my apartment was burglarized several weeks ago. All the vandals made off with was my xbox 360 and some games. Not much in the way of material goods, but they cost me something harder to replace: peace of mind and faith in humanity. Something you may not know is that my family's a bit dysfunctional, full of halves, steps, erratic behavior, strained relationships and severe psychoses. Because of that, I've always put a higher value on friendship. These are the people I've chosen to be part of my life, not simply inherited at birth. I love my closest friends as I would my own kin, but every now and then you forget how wonderful and valuable friendship can be. I was so down about the burglary and my family's ruined Thanksgiving that I lost sight of the power of friendship. But, thanks to a cadre of my most boon companions, including KTL and Jinx, I've had all that restored.

You see, they all got together and replaced the things that were stolen. Now, as happy as that makes me, it is nothing in comparison to what else they replaced. They restored my faith in humanity and reaffirmed my value in friendship. These are all special people to me and I hope they know that. It is definitely an amazing group of people we have collected into this friendship. We have created bonds that are still strong, years after college and nearing 30. We are spread from Athens to ATL, to Baltimore and Pennsylvania and on to New York. Though we are scattered, we remain bonded in one thing: friendship. And really, when it's all said and done, that is more valuable than any trinket or material possession.

I had something taken from me and these guys rallied and helped me get it back. They also gave me a reason to take pause and think about how much they mean to me. Xbox's come and go, friendship is forever.

To everyone involved - Thank You, from the bottom of my heart. I know you have my back, and you know I have yours. We truly are brothers and I hope we are more appreciative of that as time goes on. Remember the good, forgive the bad, and always be there for the one that's down.

As Clete Purcell would say, "Good guys forever"-