PFC Jessica Lynch, Y2K, and nothing to do with triathlons

So I was checking the top news stories yesterday, and saw a nice happy story of that former POW Jessica Lynch. "What a nice story," I thought. So I clicked on it.

I read it, and had a "wait--you've GOTTA be kiddin' me" moment.

So I had to do a little searching to find out if you've-gotta-be-kiddin'-me was in fact, true. It wasn't, but in the process, I accidentally discovered where someone I once knew was. A person I had a relationship with, when I lived in Cincinnati 8 years ago. I accidentally found that person is, for all intents and purposes, doing what I knew he'd worked hard to do, had a job at a certain university, and also was married like myself. And I thought, "Well, that's nice. He was a good guy, and even though things didn't end very well, I always knew he was a good guy."

And then for some reason, I didn't think about HIM anymore, but everything surrounding his memory. It was like I was watching a movie where he played a very, VERY small role, and the important stuff was really everything else.

I'm turning 30 this year. I'm actually really excited about this. But I have to admit that I'm already starting to feel a little sad, not at getting older because there is SO much to look forward to. But, for how AWESOME my 20s have been. Still are, I should say. I've still got 6 months. :)

I started thinking about where I was when I was with this person--how we met at a Mount Adams bar that I can't even remember the name of when Jacks was visiting from her 2 year program in Lexington, KY. Writing my number on a napkin. Dinner at a Mexican restaurant.

BUT--what's more important is that I remembered everything else about that time--it just started coming to me in these waves and I started smiling--and even laughing!--at the memories. I remembered being a first year teacher that fall, living with 2 of my best friends and having a ton of friends within 10 miles of me. Thinking I knew what I was getting myself into, as, 4 weeks after turning 22, I moved into my first real apartment, and I entered my first real classroom. My parents took this picture right before they left after helping me move in.

Then, I remembered having 168 students and realizing that teaching was in NO WAY what I thought it would be.

How in some ways it was the hardest year of my life, and in others it was the best thing that I've ever done, being at that school, staying up until 3:37am grading and thinking and trying so hard to figure out how to teach subjects I knew so well to 168 subjects I was struggling to reach. I remember making the decision to move that spring--to leave my friends and the classroom I was finally getting warmed up in. I remember the scrapbook the kids made me, that I still have, with all the notes and pictures they wrote.

I remembered these freshman girls, who are now 22. They are the age that I was in that picture. My seniors that first year are now 25. I remember all of their names, when I went back through my books. You never forget your first class.

I remembered packing up my classroom that June, after saying goodbye. The second the kids left--the moment the last one shut the door--I cried the whole time.

I thought about meeting Rizzo, another brand new first-year English teacher who was placed directly across the hall from me, and realizing just how important it is for some people to come into your life. How things change and you move on, and move up, and move away...but they've changed you and will always be with you. How strong she was with what she was going through, and how close we got so fast--us "outsiders:" her playing the role of Jersey girl, me a Clevelander with a "funny accent," both of us with Italian last names and a sarcastic sense of humor.

I'm reminded that the relationship that reminded me of all these times was over by Y2K. It was short. But I remember it being fun--I remember laughing with Rizzo about these things on our morning commute across 1-74 in our old cars with 140,000 miles on them, listening to the Dixie Chicks and Y96--the ONLY time in my life I've ever listened to country music. About riding the bull at some hole-in-the-wall-bar called Bobby Mackey's in Kentucky. (Kentucky!)

I remember how my friends from Cleveland came down for New Years 1999, and Mindy came home in the middle of her 2 year Peace Corps stint in Belize. And how that night I had all my friends, old and new, there to celebrate what many thought would be the end of the world. But our computers won't work! But our cell phones! Stock up on water and batteries! How now, as I look back, it seems so ridiculous. We had no idea that the day that would really change everything-everything-would come 21 months later, one sunny morning in September.

I remembered all the mistakes I made. Some were good--like Sheryl Crow says, "my favorite mistakes." Some changed my life and led to a lot of happiness. Some were very bad. And every time I fell flat on my face, either that year or later years, these girls were there. I lived my Carrie Bradshaw years in an apartment with them, and I lived paycheck to paycheck on my small teacher's salary, but I felt as rich as a queen.

All of this hit me today after reading a stupid little news story. It's bizarre--like I'm staring back at this decade, but at the same time looking forward at a new one. And I think--can it be as good? Can I be surrounded by such friends? Will I make such dumb mistakes? Will I have as much fun? We are all a few hours away now, not a few miles: Denver, D.C, St. Louis, Columbus, Indianapolis, Chicago, Cincinnati. Many of us are married. All of us have great jobs, some of us have kids. But I'm also reminded that at the time, some things seemed so bad...some mistakes irreversable, some problems insurmountable. Sometimes, I'd call Sam and Jill and not even be able to talk--I'd just cry. But they were there. We got through it--everything. Every time.

So now I've got nothing left really to do, except be reminded, by a roundabout and rather random way through a story on the news, of how good I have it. I wouldn't trade any of these memories, these mistakes, these friendships for a billion dollars if you offered it to me.

And I understand that I have many, many more mistakes in my future. But, what I also have are amazing friends who will be there to catch me, and I'll catch them, too, even if they are not in my time zone.

My twenties are almost done.

So, I'll take all these memories with me as I turn a new corner and open the next door.

"We do not remember days...we remember moments." --Cesare Pavese