That Day

We all have some. "That day" - the day when... We share some communally, September 11th, 2001, of course, and others that depend on culture or age. And some, well, some are just ours alone.

For whatever reason, I seem to have more than my share. My life, it turns out, happens in clumps. I go along with no discernable excitement and then bam! everything piles up on one day or a couple days. Maybe this happens to lots of us. Maybe certain days just draw that kind of energy. Who knows? I just know it's very distinct for me.

Which takes me to this past Friday, June 6th. Even historically, it seems to be a whopper - D Day, 6 Day War kind of big, both of which happened on or during 6/6. The day I graduated from high school (okay not so big). It is also my son's birthday and, nine years after that, the day my mother died, as though perhaps she wanted to make sure I wouldn't forget or something. So emotionally, another whopper. This year, it was also the day school finally ended. But as in my world that couldn't be enough, it was also the last day one of my dearest work pals ended her tenure at our school. It's a rare miracle to find someone at work who has your sense of humor and your back at the same time, and my pal Beth Ann was both of those. We'd taught next door to each other for a number of years and she was definitely my touchstone, the person I'd go to when I had to ask "Don't you find this ridiculous?" (She always did) or "You're not going to believe what this kid did! (she always did) or "Good lord, Crazy Johnny has set his mohawk on fire, do you have a spare bottle of Ozarka?" (she always did) or "Do you know that math teacher down the hall has never said hello to me once and always averts her gaze when she passes by me in the hall which is like forty five times a day and has been doing this every day even though we've worked twenty feet from each other for five years? Do you think she's pathologically unfriendly?" (She always agreed) So the fact that she'll be doing her thing elsewhere now really just has me a little crazy. Schools, if you didn't know, aren't always filled with people you can trust. So when you find one, it's such a miracle you hate to lose it.

Anyway, that's my June 6th story. My kid is now 22!!! which is kind of odd since I'm only 29, but what can you do? Anyone else have clumps of events fall onto a single date?

Til next time...