We exchange a happy birthday once a year and hang out about as often. I’m rough like a gravel road, never clean cut and rarely maintained. Fortunately she stops the rock slide that I continually fall into, tumbling and eventually brought to halt. She fills my holes when I get too coarse. The same birthday doesn’t make plurals singular. We offset and balance better than reciprocals. I am not her and she is not me. We see few similarities beyond our noses, though mine is crooked, it’s her nose. My imperfections are her strengths. Like my nose, I’m the anti-perfectionist and she’ll fight to keep her ducks in a row. I can sense her faultless personality in the sound of her voice; I speak back to her coarsely and aspire to reach her pedestal. I know that she won’t stop pursuing my perfection and will always guide me over my rocky road.