Days Gone By
Last month, I flooded my basement while Tim was at work. I tossed a pair of soiled Hot Wheels undies into the big, deep laundry sink, turned on the water and then answered the phone. I strolled outside to the deck, plopped down on the chair and chatted for almost an hour. Then I came back inside and, while farting around on facebook for a few minutes, thought "What am I hearing? what's that soft and steady noise?" I walked down the hall to investigate and fell flat on my ass in a large pool of water. We've got main floor laundry so, of course, the water went through to the basement turning my neat boxes of folded baby clothes into mushy cardboard piles. Drip drip drip. Boxes of high school yearbooks and childhood photos in imminent danger! I tore around the storage room, heaving as many boxes as I could to safety before I caved in and called Tim to fess up. I was so mad at myself that I wished I could give myself a noogie, a wedgie and a wet willy. The schoolyard bully's trifecta.
The basement disaster of 2012, as it's become known as, forced us to sift through our boxes of crap. Some of those boxes hadn't been opened for years, we hadn't even unpacked them when we moved into our old house 6 years ago. We moved them to this house and, once again, never got to them.
What an incredible treasure trove of memories! A photo of a 13 year old me, wide-eyed, frizzy hair blowing in the wind on a whale watching boat in Boston. I've got the hugest smile, my braces are glinting in the sun. I was away from my parents for a whole week, on my 8th grade trip, I felt so independent. Even better, I felt like I fit in. Picking up the entire 8th grade student body and dropping them in a foreign place disrupted the hierarchy of popularity. For one lovely, phony, week I was one of the cool kids. We laughed, we ate lobster tail, we learned about the Boston Tea party. We came back just a few weeks before school wrapped up, just in time for a series of pool parties in rich kid's backyards. I didn't get invited to any of them. The same girls that had laughed with me only a couple weeks earlier had slipped back into the roles they'd occupied before Boston. Don't you ever wish you could sit across from a 13 year old you and have a good chat? What would you say? I'd tell a 13 year-old me that this won't matter a lick in 20 years. That 20 years will actually go by quickly. I'd tell her that she's plenty cool.
I found letters from friends in high school. Some letters said that I was a wonderful friend to them, others said that I was a heinous bitch. Not actually sure why I hung onto those ones...self torture? They didn't give me much detail about my wrong-doings, and I simply can't remember the unraveling of those friendships. Maybe it was the margaritas in college, can you have impaired memory due to frosh week? OK, back to high school. Maybe I was self-centered, I can be guilty of that even nowadays, getting caught up in my own world. Maybe I dated someone they liked. OK, not very sensitive of me. Maybe I got some new interests outside of school and my friends felt jilted. What would I say to a 15 year old me? I'd tell her that she's not the only angst ridden teenager on the planet. I'd tell her it's not all about her, all the time. I'd tell her to work harder on those early friendships, it'd be nice to have someone in your life at 30 who knew you at 15.
There were notes from boys who, seemingly, adored me. I'd tell an 18 year old me to be kind to these boys, they won't be around for too long. Learn what you can from from them, you'll appreciate the man you end up with even more because of the lessons you take away from these guys. Hopefully when they pop into your mind, 15 years later, because of a song on the radio or a movie quote, you'll think of them fondly. I'd tell an 18 year old me to forgive herself for anything cringe-worthy that she's done, she's figuring it out as she goes and Rom-Coms do not set good examples for functional, real life, relationships. I'd tell her to set down the remote and walk away from the crappy Jennifer Aniston movies.
Is it possible to make it through childhood, adolescence and early adulthood without regret? Is it possible to look back and think "I was awesome, I didn't screw up a damn thing!"? I doubt it. Anyone who says such a thing is flat-out lying or enjoys a very selective memory. I'm sure that when I'm 60, I'll have things to say to a 40 year old me. Hell, I've got some advice to give to last week's me! I know I've made some bad calls in my 31 years on the planet. Still, today I've got an amazing group of girlfriends. I've got a husband I wouldn't trade for all the tea in China, two kids who make me feel like I could spontaneously explode because I adore them so much. It seems that I've been doing A-OK. So the notes can go back in the boxes, the photos can go back into the rubber bands that held them before the flood. Life moves on and thank goodness for that.
The basement disaster of 2012, as it's become known as, forced us to sift through our boxes of crap. Some of those boxes hadn't been opened for years, we hadn't even unpacked them when we moved into our old house 6 years ago. We moved them to this house and, once again, never got to them.
What an incredible treasure trove of memories! A photo of a 13 year old me, wide-eyed, frizzy hair blowing in the wind on a whale watching boat in Boston. I've got the hugest smile, my braces are glinting in the sun. I was away from my parents for a whole week, on my 8th grade trip, I felt so independent. Even better, I felt like I fit in. Picking up the entire 8th grade student body and dropping them in a foreign place disrupted the hierarchy of popularity. For one lovely, phony, week I was one of the cool kids. We laughed, we ate lobster tail, we learned about the Boston Tea party. We came back just a few weeks before school wrapped up, just in time for a series of pool parties in rich kid's backyards. I didn't get invited to any of them. The same girls that had laughed with me only a couple weeks earlier had slipped back into the roles they'd occupied before Boston. Don't you ever wish you could sit across from a 13 year old you and have a good chat? What would you say? I'd tell a 13 year-old me that this won't matter a lick in 20 years. That 20 years will actually go by quickly. I'd tell her that she's plenty cool.
I found letters from friends in high school. Some letters said that I was a wonderful friend to them, others said that I was a heinous bitch. Not actually sure why I hung onto those ones...self torture? They didn't give me much detail about my wrong-doings, and I simply can't remember the unraveling of those friendships. Maybe it was the margaritas in college, can you have impaired memory due to frosh week? OK, back to high school. Maybe I was self-centered, I can be guilty of that even nowadays, getting caught up in my own world. Maybe I dated someone they liked. OK, not very sensitive of me. Maybe I got some new interests outside of school and my friends felt jilted. What would I say to a 15 year old me? I'd tell her that she's not the only angst ridden teenager on the planet. I'd tell her it's not all about her, all the time. I'd tell her to work harder on those early friendships, it'd be nice to have someone in your life at 30 who knew you at 15.
There were notes from boys who, seemingly, adored me. I'd tell an 18 year old me to be kind to these boys, they won't be around for too long. Learn what you can from from them, you'll appreciate the man you end up with even more because of the lessons you take away from these guys. Hopefully when they pop into your mind, 15 years later, because of a song on the radio or a movie quote, you'll think of them fondly. I'd tell an 18 year old me to forgive herself for anything cringe-worthy that she's done, she's figuring it out as she goes and Rom-Coms do not set good examples for functional, real life, relationships. I'd tell her to set down the remote and walk away from the crappy Jennifer Aniston movies.
Is it possible to make it through childhood, adolescence and early adulthood without regret? Is it possible to look back and think "I was awesome, I didn't screw up a damn thing!"? I doubt it. Anyone who says such a thing is flat-out lying or enjoys a very selective memory. I'm sure that when I'm 60, I'll have things to say to a 40 year old me. Hell, I've got some advice to give to last week's me! I know I've made some bad calls in my 31 years on the planet. Still, today I've got an amazing group of girlfriends. I've got a husband I wouldn't trade for all the tea in China, two kids who make me feel like I could spontaneously explode because I adore them so much. It seems that I've been doing A-OK. So the notes can go back in the boxes, the photos can go back into the rubber bands that held them before the flood. Life moves on and thank goodness for that.
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