Something I'm trying to make sense of ::Part 1::

"After a day as good as today, how do you go back to the same life as yesterday?"

I first wrote this line in my notebook on April 19, 2004, and it's followed me around ever since. It was especially true of a day a couple weeks ago, a day I'm only beginning to wrap my head around. I took a trip to Florida to see my first-ever friend get married. To a wonderful man, at that. And I guess if any of the rest of this is going to make any sense, I have to first talk about that.

I have very few memories of a time before A___. We went to the same preschool from early on, somewhere between 9 and 15-ish months of age. From that point forward, she appears in many, if not most, of my significant memories of childhood. To name a few: a preschool field trip where we traded tiny freshwater clam shells picked off the shores of the Delaware because we were best friends, probably the very point at which symbolism entered my life. Starting each day coloring in pictures her mother drew for us. The first time I ever had a playdate at my house: we trashed my room, pulling every stuffed animal in my inventory off the shelves and playing make-believe all day. The first sleepover I ever went to: we gave each other moisturizing facials that were bright blue and ran around the house until they dried enough to peel off. Most subsequent sleepovers went much the same way. Even though we went to different schools after age four, she remained my best friend. She was always the person I wanted to be more like. I was always just a little behind- not as good at Super Mario World, my hair never as long or flowy, certainly not as good in sports or at dancing (I still think her improv in the middle of that one dance recital video is better than the choreography- I stand by this). But despite never feeling like I was as good, I still wanted to be around her. As we matured, as she grew tall and thin and I stayed stuck at five feet and, admittedly, a little chubby, I only wanted more and more to learn how to be more like A___. I never thought to be intimidated or resentful the way I somehow learned with subsequent female acquaintances. I just enjoyed dressing up together for Halloween, being silly together, planning (for years, at that) to build a wonderful, magical flying car that we could get away in instead of cleaning up our rooms at dinnertime... I enjoyed talking about boys, music videos, just doing life together. I always imagined us being friends forever. I imagined us as grown-ups living next door to each other in Florida ('cuz that's where Disney World is- and by the way, we'd drink nothing but virgin strawberry daiquiris like we had all during our Disney trip when we were 11)... I pictured us at each other's weddings.

So even as we drifted apart during the high school years, after she became a boarder at her high school and I moved north just enough for my parents to remind me what a chore it was to cart me back and forth between our new lives and the old, even all through that time I thought about her often. The internet was still newish back then, and I'm bad at the phone, so all I really knew how to do was think about her and miss having my friend in my life.

I regret, these days, missing out on that part of her life and not including her more in that part of mine.

She caught up with me last year, at 25, after 10 years of only an email here, a family Christmas card there. And through the wonders of Facebook...

So yeah, I wouldn't have missed this wedding for anything. And even though I wondered for a while whether I was still at all relevant in the crowd, there I was in the classic wedding "This is Your Life" slideshow. The two of us wearing those silly glasses with the big noses and mustaches. Together in a preschool play. Dressed up as hippies for Halloween. And I realized I was there because we had shaped each other. I have no idea how much I gave to her, and I'm not going to flatter myself by thinking it's all that much. But I realized that so much of who I am is because of her. As much as I try to tell myself that I'm a new person every time I move or change boyfriends or start a new job. There is no denying that I came from that little girl who just wanted to be always-friends with A___. And there I was, at her wedding, seeing her all grown up and knowing that I am too. Still just a step or two behind, but just happy that she found someone who I knew instantly was right for her at the very core of who she is. Because it's who we've always been.

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Today was a Rough Day. A Long Day. A day that Keeps Going. I wanted to cry more than once, but decided to suck it up and be a big girl instead. So along that line of thinking, here is a list of things that didn't suck about today (aka, things that make me happy- in no particular order at all):

1) New sheets. Yes, they're a little more purple than they looked in the store, but really, how did I not know about combed cotton until today?

2) Coconut shrimp with mango chutney. 15 minutes in the oven = deliciousness.

3) Checking everything (well, all the important stuff) off my list before leaving work for the day.

4) There is a fluffy cat on my lap right now, and his eyes say "there is nowhere else in the world I would rather be than here with my mommy."

5) Clock spider in the corner? Dead. Much easier to remove than the live ones. :)

6) I received like, 1,123 long-distance hugs from old friends tonight.

7) Despite being a requirement, I get to make a collage for a school project. I like making collages even more than I like making lists.

8) I am in the midst of an Arrested Development binge, and it is wonderful. Try staying sad or angry while watching this show. I dare you.

9) Being included on a business trip to Boston is ever-so-slightly more likely after today.

10) Peanut butter and wild raw honey on wheat toast.

11) A back-and-forth game of "here's a song you'll like" with a good friend.

That's right. This list is so awesome it goes to 11.

From 10/9/09

I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy it just a little bit: sprinting through the ATL airport to catch my connecting flight, scheduled to depart in only minutes. Knowing that people were looking at me, feeling artificially important. I can admit it because I so rarely do anything that makes me actually important, therefore I can afford to indulge my narcissism on occasion.

Anyway, it wasn't just that I felt eyes on me; it was the thrill of not knowing for sure that I'd make it. It was the brilliant feeling of forcing my legs to keep carrying me (and my backpack, and my prescribed neck pillow- which, by the way, was so worth it) even though they told me they were done. It was the adrenaline that built as I first started my trek 1000 feet to the B terminal, the decision to hoof it instead of waiting for a tram. The real-life video game appeal of dodging other travelers as I careened through the airport, praying I wouldn't trip over my own feet- which almost happened a few times, let me tell you.

It was the gradual release of anxiety as I began to count down the B gates, from somewhere in the twenties down to two as I continuously weighed those numbers against the few precious remaining minutes before my flight would leave me behind without so much as a backward glance.

Then, finally, at the gate, the quiet, unannounced glory of "I win." The singular knowing, as I boarded the almost-full plane, red-faced, out-of-breath, that I had worked harder for my place than anyone else.

By the way, ATL is a hot, sticky place in October.