Random thoughts...

This is my 30th year. I will turn 30 this year, as will many of my friends. A group of my highschool friends have been talking over the last couple days about a possible trip, to celebrate reaching this milestone. We're thinking the end of the year, as most of us will be 30 by then, and those that aren't, will be in a very short time. Nothing extravagant, maybe a trip to Blue Mountain...some spa treatments, some drinks by the fire...

The first of us in that group of girls joined the thirty something group today. Happy Happy Birthday to you my dear friend Candice.

30. really? Are we really planning a getaway for our 30th birthdays? Seems like yesterday we were planning what to wear to the prom...which is a story in itself...perhaps another day.

Seem like yesterday we were agonizing over Shakepeare, Calculus (not me, never made it that far), and which Colleges or Universities to apply to.
Seems like yesterday we were trying to find someone old enough to buy our drinks....seems like yesterday we couldn't wait to be older...and now here we are. Some of us are or are about to be married, some of us have or are about to have kids, one is building her dream home, one is living her dream, halfway around the world, in Australia.

30. When did that happen?


Today is significant in another way too. April 14 2007 changed my tiny hometown of Gorrie forever when one of its own kids, 16 year old Travis, was killed in a hit and run accident just outside of town. He was one of my cousin's best friends, his dad was close to my uncle...one way or another, everyone knew him. I knew him best when he was younger and I worked at the little restaurant in town. It was your typical smalltown restaurant, with the older men who came in for coffee every day, the "after church" crowd, the young families going out every Friday night - their treat for the week. Travis's family was one of those families, he and his sister were preschoolers at the time, and such happy, sweet kids with big smiles. I loved visiting with them and their parents and had regular, ongoing conversations with them over time. 3 years ago that family was ripped apart, 3 of my cousins had their first experience with of the death of a friend...lives were changed forever.

3 years ago.

30.

Sometimes the days seem so slow. But the years are flying by.