Fifteen Years Later

This past Friday, my dear friend/wingman and I drove five hours to attend our fifteen year college reunion in upstate NY.  Back when we registered, we thought it would be both easy and fun to bunk together in the very dorm that I lived in freshman year.  It should have been no surprise to us that the rooms are still small and stuffy and that the beds are incredibly uncomfortable but it shocked us nonetheless.  I'm sure when were were eighteen we were totally unfazed by the strange smells and the communal bathrooms but at age 37 it was a little tough to deal with.  Fortunately for us, several good friends from our class were staying down the hall so despite the lack of frills, we were pretty happy with our decision.  Saturday morning, a bunch of us met up to go for a run.  Fifteen years ago we had an uncanny ability to stay up all night, both studying and, well, not studying, and then to roll out of bed at the crack of dawn and go running without thinking twice about it.  Fifteen years later, that is no longer the case.  It took us a little while to get going but we we gave ourselves credit for motivating as it was clear that the majority of our peers were still asleep and would be for several hours.  In this particular group, four of the five of us ran together on the cross country team and the fifth, though not on the team, was also a big runner.  Between all of us, a lot of miles were logged over the four years that we were there.  We all had a little skip in our step as we headed down the same roads that we used to train on day in an day out as students.  Fifteen years ago, the smell of manure used to make us gag and we often had to avoid stepping in it as we ran by the many farms in the area.  Fifteen years later, the farms on our route smelled exactly the same.  As we ran, it was as if no time had passed.  We jabbered away just like we used to, but instead of talking about classes and parties, we brought each other up to speed on our families, our jobs and the happenings in our lives.  We reminisced about some of the funny moments during the cross country season (including the time our coach handed us briefs and told us we would no longer being wearing shorts for our races - what?) as we tackled the same huge, rolling hills that used to challenge us back in the day.  Forty five minutes flew by in what felt like five minutes and despite being a little sad that it was over, this run was undoubtedly one of the highlights of my weekend.  Fifteen years ago we ran together; happy, healthy and excited about what lay ahead.  Fifteen years later we ran together; happy, healthy and excited about what lay ahead.

Listen to this:

Elegant Design - Pond