This will be fairly short.  It’s an extremely cold morning again today and I have to take the kids to school and then take the car in to the mechanic to get some work done.  Mo’money. 

Just a brief anecdote on memory and maybe what drives us.

Two days ago I ran across the website for a magic store here in the Chicagoland area and the name of the owner was familiar to me. 

I sent a note to the site and asked if the owner might be the old friend, not close, from long ago.  We had lived on the same floor in the same dormitory in college and hung out with some of the same people for a couple years.  After that we went our separate ways.

I remembered that this guy was into magic and was very good at it so that is why I figured it must be him who was the owner of the magic store.  I sent a note that cited a few items as a way of proving that I knew him, if it was him.  I also remembered some of the things we had done, the type of music he liked, and, to the best of my ability, what he looked like.  I don’t have many pictures from that time unfortunately.

I received a response shortly after I sent the note. 

He wanted to know if I was the same guy who still owed him for a piece of audio gear from way back then.  He added an inquiry as to what I had been up to but that came second.

I responded in some embarrassment and offered to pay for the gear. 

That was a long time ago but I should have remembered and didn’t.  But he did.

I have not yet received another response accepting my offer to square up my debt.  Not yet.

Some time ago I ran into another old dorm-mate who worked at a pet store.  He is a biologist and knew a ton about animals and even more about fish and aquatic environments. He works as an environmentalist of sorts and helps preserve some of the local areas around the main river that runs through these parts.

We came to the realization of our common past by chance during random conversation.  He entered that college a year after me and while we resided on the same floor for two years we hung out with a completely different set of friends and did not really remember each other directly.  That happens kids.

The next time I went to the shop with my kids the fish expert had brought in an old picture from his friends in the dorm during spring break in Florida.  Interestingly I lived in Florida for a long time but that has no bearing here.  He described each of his chums but only a couple of names sparked even a slight memory on my part.  You could tell he was remembering what for him were very good times.

But, sorry, I couldn’t remember his chums and I didn’t remember the debt I owed the magic man.

A magic man, a fish expert and an ex-engineer.  An anecdote about some old shared experiences from a time long ago in a place not now so very far away; and what one remembers while the other does not and what seems important to each after so many years.

Guess we’ve traveled a long way fellas.