Bittersweet Friends

Have you taken your high school yearbook off the dusty shelf and flipped through that bad boy recently? All the mortifying, hilarious, unforgettable moments come flooding back, and all of a sudden you are sucked back in time and become that awkward 15 year old with terrible hair and bad fashion sense. Faces that you’ve forgotten, people you wish you forgot, teachers who appeared *so* old at the time, and now you realize you yourself are likely the same age NOW that they were at that time. It’s crazy how memories seem to tuck themselves into the deepest recesses of your mind, and come flooding back at the thought of a name, or the face of a guy you used to ride the bus with in 8th grade. And one mustn’t forget the awesomely awful write-ups we gave each other in the blank pages in between the those pictures; those often give far more insight into relationships we had. People we promised to be friends with forever and then promptly forgot a week after graduation. You can tell the people you didn’t really know who signed “Have a great summer, we should hang out some time”, to those epic entries that are riddled with inside jokes (often inside jokes you yourself can’t even recall the meaning to) alluding to pot smoking and secretive drinking behind the bleachers after school. Ahhh, we were all such badasses (in our own heads, if nowhere else). And those sacred few who we’ve still held onto after all this time:

What has happened to all these people? I often think of certain people and wonder where life has taken them. The “popular” people who likely ended up getting married and having kids in their earlier twenties… and then likely divorced in their late twenties. How many stayed in the same tiny town, content to live and work in the same place that their parents put down roots? How many of us fled that same town, hoping only to make a new life for ourselves in the city, lost in the anonymity of faces. As far away from that preconceived persona we had established while growing up? Quite a few of us I’m sure. All the “losers” became the coolest, most successful, good looking people in the room. The assholes are likely still assholes – only now they’ve replaced the school hallways with sweaty bars and boardrooms.

Remember how life was *so* complicated, and every mortifying thing signaled the end of the world? Things now that are so cliche, so John Hughes-esque it’s funny. We never listened to adults who told us we had nothing to worry about, just wait until you’re a “REAL” adult when responsibility kicks in. And yet none of us (even today) can wrap our heads around that until we’ve experienced it ourselves.

I still wonder about where people have gone. Are they in jail? Have they had 4 kids now and work in a mill? Have they died? Are they making hundreds of thousands of dollars laughing at how the best revenge is living well? I guess networks like Facebook allow us to glance inside where people have ended up without the awkward chit-chat when you run into someone in a grocery store lineup. But there are still those who are unaccounted for, those that you can’t help but wonder about.

What were the things that you thought you would have accomplished by the time you were 30? How have your plans changed? Here’s what I thought:

1. Well, first off I never thought I would have survived to thirty!
2. I thought I would have graduated from Emily Carr (check)
3. That I would have traveled the world and ended up living in Europe (nope and nope)
4. That I would be living with someone (nope)
5. That I would be an artist (kind of)
6. I would own a vintage VW bug (yes, in my early 20′s)
7. That I would still have flaming red hair – and more piercings
8. … and I would never be sick of the tattoos I chose

Here’s what actually happened:

1. I know even less now that I did then about what direction I’m heading in
2. I live in a fantastic apartment solo (not even a cat) and this is totally O.K. with me
3. I never got to travel, but it’s still up there on the list
4. I don’t know if I will ever have kids
5. Or get married
6. I’m still working on finding a career that I’m thrilled to go to (I’ll find you one day, dream job – watch out!)
7. I take a hell of a lot of photos. I never “seriously” picked up a camera really until I was 22
8. The idea of mortgages and RRSP’s and investment banking scares the living shit out of me
9. I still dream of running away
10. I seriously hate the tattoos I chose when I was 17 – just like they warned me I would
11. I doubt I will ever own a “responsible” car, but would rather buy another vintage VW bug in a second, even though the first one I had was a complete piece of crap

It’s interesting where life takes us. And the choices that we make today DO end up steering down paths we never even dreamed existed. We can only hope that we end up with less cringe-worthy moments – although it’s not likely