Old Friends
An old friend got in touch with me yesterday. It's been 15 years since we last spoke, nearly. He said he came across my grad school bio last week online (not sure how he fell across that little tidbit!), and decided to look me up on good ole' Facebook. There are 2 people with my name on their server (the other is from London and has decidedly different features from me), so at that point it likely wasn't that hard to find me.
I was touched that he thought to look me up.
We were good friends, great friends you might say, but not long-time friends. He was someone I had a short, fun, exciting and crazy intense relationship with. I genuinely liked him. We met online, and talked for hours and hours over months. I remember being exhausted in classes some days because we had stayed up all night talking. Talking, talking, talking. I flew to the other end of the continent over my freshman winter vacation to spend it with him (my first time travelling outside the country).
He was going to UCLA at the time, he was interested in politics, he made me laugh, he was interested in me and he was smart - and he made me feel smart, beautiful and sexy. He was good for me. I remember the nervous feeling in my stomach as I was getting off the plane to meet him, all the questions racing around in my head (mostly about my level of sanity!!)... he met me at the airport with a rose, (I wasn't hard to impress at 18!), and we stayed at his loft in LA. He showed me all around the city, took me on my first trip to Disneyland, Hollywood, Venice beach... it was an incredible vacation (thank you student loans people!), and I remember it with nothing but fondness (and a bit of pink flush in cheeks, even now).
We had a fantastic time together, and after that we didn't really stay in touch (I don't remember that we did, anyway, beyond the requisite 'thank you card' type of follow up). I think of him occasionally, wonder how he's been. I come across photos occasionally in my piles of pictures... my fresh, young 18-year old self, blonde hair blowing beside the ocean, all excited about life and carefree... navel pierced and belly bared beneath a cropped tshirt... jeans barely hanging onto slim hips... confident and beautiful... smiling into the camera he was holding, a real smile behind my sparkling eyes... I look at the pictures now and again, and I smile, remembering how it felt to be me...
Life moved on for both of us, as it does, and we grew up... he spent some time in the army (a lot of time actually, surprised me, that one!), got married, got divorced, finished university, had a bunch of different jobs, and now he's taking care of his father and working on being a writer (something in the California water, I think). Such different stories from ones I thought he might have had. And then again maybe not so different underneath it all...
How does he see me, after our brief reacquaintence? How does he remember our time together, I wonder? Men and women have such different outlooks, different perspectives on life, on people. I'd like to hear about that time in our lives through his eyes...
Things to do... +10/-5 every year
The list would look very different if it started before my travels began, but in the here and now, here is where it's at...
2009 List: 1. Finish my master's degree 2. Become fluent in another language 3. See something from at least 6 of the 7 continents (asia, north america (Mexico), south america, europe, africa, australia; antarctica - no thank you!) 4. Create a list of 100 books I would like to read 5. Take piano lessons 6. Learn functional Spanish Enter a 5km race and finish it 8. Make a list of 100 places I’d like to travel 9. Make myself a nice dress 10. Plant a garden of wildflowers (June 2009) 11. Take a yoga class (Korea 2010) 12. Try Bikram yoga (Korea 2010) 13. Learn to make 3 Korean dishes well 14. Be debt free 15. Be certified as an Advanced Open Water Diver (Thailand 2010) 16. Be certified as a Divemaster 17. Take the 4-week course in Thailand to finish diving certification to become an Instructor 18. Dive the Great Barrier Reef 19. Have a baby, become a mamma 20. Start a diveshop with an attached coffee/sandwich shop somewhere hot and beautiful 21. Go on a temple stay to a Buddhist Temple (Korea 2010) 22. Learn how to fly a plane 23. Learn how to sail 24. Ride a camel in the desert because it's the mode of transport (not a tourist trap) 25. Kayak into a cave to explore 26. Dive a shipwreck 27. See a big angelfish in the "wilds" (Thailand 2010) 28. Lounge on a beach along the mediterranean 29. Make a trek through a desert 30. Exercise regularly (at least 3 days per week) 31. Grow a vegetable garden (Alberta 2009) 32. Skate in Central Park 33. Live in India 34. Go to Mardi Gras 35. Visit an old section of the Great Wall, and hike along it 36. Spend a 3-day pass exploring Angkor Wat in SiemReap 37. Scuba dive somewhere in Canada 38. Spend the day at a spa luxuriating in spa treatments 39. Take a sketching class 40. Take a digital photography course 41. Travel in Sri Lanka 42. Explore the pyramids and the sphinx in Egypt 43. Learn to surf 44. Figure out why I'm obsessed about Ireland 45. Go to Machu Picchu 46. Study a martial art (for at least 6 months) 47. Drive around on a motorcycle in Vietnam 48. Go cliff diving 49. Keep a travel journal 50. Learn how to bellydance 51. Take a hot-air balloon ride 52. Learn to play badduk 53. Camp in a country other than Canada or the US 54. Go horseback riding in the mountains 55. See the Grand Canyon 56. Carve something nice out of wood 57. Take my mom on a vacation somewhere (Hawaii 2010) 58. Go on a multi-day kayaking trip somewhere beautiful 59. Visit a floating village 60. See a cave of crystal 61. Keep a journal going for one year (electronic or paper) 62. Design and make a piece of jewelery 63. Take a wilderness survival course 64. Order lunch from a floating market vendor 65. Learn how to paint with watercolors 66. Consult a medicine person or traditional healer 67. Ride in a horse-drawn carriage 68. Go parasailing 69. Go spelunking 70. Actually teach scuba diving 71. Take a cruise somewhere (maybe when I'm old!) :) 72. Learn to be a decent chess player 73. Visit a tribe of people somewhere who still live traditionally 74. Learn to make paper with flowers 75. Visit the ruins of a famous Greek or Roman temple 76. Learn to ballroom dance and perform once in front of people 77. Take a gondola in Venice 78. Go on a photo safari on a wildlife preserve in Africa 79. Participate in an active (i.e. real) archaeological dig 80. Go to Carnival in Brazil 81. Live in Italy 82. See an otter playing in the wild 83. Build a birdfeeder that birds actually use 84. Take some great photos underwater (Thailand 2010) 85. Go rafting (whitewater or not) 86. Live on an island somewhere 87. Volunteer in a country other than Canada 88. Climb to the top of a "famous" mountain 89. Become a "Dr." of something 90. Learn a song in a foreign language 91. Grow my own roses 92. Keep up on my blog 93. Host a dinner party for friends 94. Get a henna design done on my hand or foot in India 95. Sell some of my hand-made cards 96. Live somewhere in Africa 97. Visit a volcano 98. Go on a bicycle tour 99. Try snowboarding 100. Go to the coliseum in Rome 2010 Additions: 101. Go spelunking 102. Visit a city carved into a mountain or hillside 103. Make a scrapbook 104. Join a choir for fun 105. Make prints of some of my photos for the wall 106. Get to RSD dearmouring course 107. Finish the Red Lodge program 108. Visit my friends in the US 109. Take a train trip in Canada somewhere 110. 2011 Additions: 111. Sundance again 112. Join a recreational sport 113. Live in a big Canadian city 114. Go back to indoor climbing for fun 115. Eat a scorpion on a stick 116. Take a kid camping 117. See a live concert of a group/artist I really enjoy 118. Volunteer with the police again 119. Counsel kids 120. Go paragliding
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