Remember. The. Time.

Yes, that is a Michael Jackson reference.  And yes, that is Bobby Brown‘s “Roni”  playing in the background as I type this post.  I am suffering from a serious case of nostalgia today.  I don’t know what the deal is but I’ve decided to go with it.  The only other option would be to shut the laptop and high-tail it to the Roller Garden for R&B Night.  It IS Thursday after all.

This morning I was so pleased and grateful to see that my first best friend on this earth posted comments.  We met in kindergarten and were inseparable for several years.  Oh my gosh did I adore her.  We both had single Moms who treated us like we were one of their own when at one or the other’s house.  I remember listening to her Mom’s Yoko Ono album and we thought it was SO funny and would laugh and laugh.  I remember her brother chasing us around her house and playing Van Halen’s “Jump” as loud as his speakers could go.  I remember seeing MTV for the first time at her house.  It was so much fun.

I changed schools and we saw each other less and less.  We still attended each other’s graduation parties and have kept in touch here and there.  I got a chance to see her several years ago when I was out west for business and it was such a joy to be with someone who has literally known me since I was five.  I have very dear close friends but none of them knew me when I was teensy like she did.  I’m so grateful to have the opportunity to still call her a friend.

Then there is Eh, who as I mentioned celebrates a birthday this weekend.  I was telling the little girls the other day that I was going to be celebrating Eh’s birthday this weekend and that it was probably the 23rd time I’d done so.  I’ve known her since I was 12 and, if paid enough money, she has all the blackmail material necessary to ruin me.  I kid, I kid, kind of…anyway…the point is that she and I have been tight for nearly 24 years.  I don’t know about you, but I think there is just something really GOOD about being with people who know you from back in the day, when you (I) had big bangs and pinned jeans.  Penny loafers.  Shoulder pads.  Braces.  Stirrups.  Sigh.

Several years ago…oh my God it was TEN years ago…okay so ten years ago I went to the wedding of a guy with whom I went to high school.  I was not having a very nice life at the time, didn’t feel so good about myself, and I was NOT enthusiastic to run into all sorts of guys from high school.  Guys from high school are the last people you want to see when you’re feeling sh-tty about yourself.  They are the ones you want to run into when you feel like you’re on top of the world.  I digress…wedding…I got there and it was like the first day of school after summer break.  But in a good way.  They were so glad to see me, and kind, and fun, and it ended up being a defining moment for me.  It made me feel like myself again.

I’m lucky in that many of the people who were important to me in junior high and high school have stayed in the general area but I see them rarely.  If it feels great to see these people from time to time, why am I not making any effort whatsoever to do just that?

TODAY:  What if I try to reconnect with those who were important to me back in the day?  Since clearly going back in time isn’t an option.