My friend S who I reconnected with after a hiatus as long as J's age, is that childhood friend who is our personal wayback machine. Each time we talk, I return to a different time and the person she once knew me to be. Those conversations make me think if the long pause in our connection contributed to this timeless feeling of our friendship.
If we grew old together without the benefit of time and space to allow us each room of our own, would it still feel this way ? It so happened, that just three months after reconnecting with her online, I had opportunity to meet her in person. The weekend together was like being in college once again. There was no political correctness or trying to play any roles. We were as natural and unadorned as we had been then in the narrow confines of our college campus and the small town adjoining it.
The realities of our life were stark then - where would we find work after college if at all, would we graduate on time, would it be best to inform the parents of our depressed friend that she needed help or should we let her ride it out, should we borrow money from the nasty rich kid next door or wait for next month's allowance to show up, would we fail the Chem finals, would our psychotic roommate spiral out of control if she failed the Chem finals, would we get a chance to go abroad for graduate studies, would the professor whose recommendation was most valuable remember we slept though his entire first semester class, did he know his nickname was Ms Toad and would that impact his desire to endorse us for grad school, would our parents lean on us to get married, would the boy we secretly liked ever like us back, did the said boy prefer our psychotic roommate to us
All of those questions have been answered a long time ago and we are where we are with less than half of our lives left to live. We talked of legacy beyond living for oneself or a select few others. S gave me gifts of costume jewelry and when I wore them I felt like a different person - one that I have not been in touch with in decades. It was strangely energizing to return briefly to my old self, connect with associations from the time of youth and naivety.
If we grew old together without the benefit of time and space to allow us each room of our own, would it still feel this way ? It so happened, that just three months after reconnecting with her online, I had opportunity to meet her in person. The weekend together was like being in college once again. There was no political correctness or trying to play any roles. We were as natural and unadorned as we had been then in the narrow confines of our college campus and the small town adjoining it.
The realities of our life were stark then - where would we find work after college if at all, would we graduate on time, would it be best to inform the parents of our depressed friend that she needed help or should we let her ride it out, should we borrow money from the nasty rich kid next door or wait for next month's allowance to show up, would we fail the Chem finals, would our psychotic roommate spiral out of control if she failed the Chem finals, would we get a chance to go abroad for graduate studies, would the professor whose recommendation was most valuable remember we slept though his entire first semester class, did he know his nickname was Ms Toad and would that impact his desire to endorse us for grad school, would our parents lean on us to get married, would the boy we secretly liked ever like us back, did the said boy prefer our psychotic roommate to us
All of those questions have been answered a long time ago and we are where we are with less than half of our lives left to live. We talked of legacy beyond living for oneself or a select few others. S gave me gifts of costume jewelry and when I wore them I felt like a different person - one that I have not been in touch with in decades. It was strangely energizing to return briefly to my old self, connect with associations from the time of youth and naivety.
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