How does it happen, that somehow, when you weren't looking, 25 turned to 29 and then WHAM, you're only a year shy of the big three oh my God I can't really be almost thirty!!!

Your thoughts start turning to marriage, commitment, children, mini-vans and 401K retirement plans. You start saving for your daughter's college tuition fund, investing your money into sure things that will grow slow and steady.

You stop taking chances.

Friends who have yet to reach the same maturity level as you, are considered irresponsible and immature. You find you don't call them anymore. There's nothing you have in common except the fact, that once, you were friends.

You think fondly back to the days when all you had to be was you.

When laser tag after dark seemed a good idea and twisting your ankle was the least of your concerns. When going to a party meant getting drunk off your ass and singing We Are the World at the top of your lungs in front of everyone at the bonfire or going for a swim in the creek because someone dared you to.

It was waking at the crack of dawn, to sneak out of the boy's dorm, so as not to advertise where or with whom you'd spent the night. Yet getting caught was inevitable. Shoes in hand and face beat red, trying to maintain some sort of dignity as you padded your way to the exit amid catcalls.

A rite of passage.

But it was with pride, that you walked the few steps back to your own dorm room, savoring the quiet taste of victory to yourself, as your roommates welcomed you back with sleepy high five's.

It was living in the moment, deciding whether or not you'd go to government class or stay home to watch an episode of Jeopardy with your friends.

It was movie nights with half the dorm packed like sardines inside your room and trying to remain silent when the quiet hours were in full effect. It was knowing the rules and every way around them to break them, never fearful of the consequences.

It was both good times and bad times, sad times and happy times, a time to live, a time to learn and a time to leave behind, as we journeyed onward towards a greater purpose.

To the girls of Penfield Hall, floor 1.
Brenda, Tracy, Robin, Carrie and me ...