Here’s to the longest friend I’ve had from Marquette. Longest? I met Helen in a class before Paul through his roommate so that’s how she receives this title.
Looking back, her birthday is special to me because we all could usually celebrate it in school: mine and Paul’s were always during vacation and Jose’s was right before final exams. I think midterms were over by then which led to everybody kicking back.
The were two memorable ones: 1988 and 1993. Helen can recall these pretty well. I won’t go into great detail on 1988 since it almost ended with the hosts being evicted from their apartment. The latter was more personal. We (Paul, Helen and I) all met in Milwaukee for a long weekend at Julie’s apartment; coincidentally, Julie shares the same birthday as Helen. We hung out with Julie’s friends mainly but took in the sights and memories of Milwaukee-Marquette. So much had changed yet we had only graduated from the area three years earlier. How I wished that weekend never ended.
On the drive home, I teared up, thinking about how much I missed my friends, the old city I used to call home and wondered why I was staying in Central Illinois. All the people in Bloomington who made life bearable moved away: Lester to Wisconsin, the Bryants to Chicago and even Phil gave up the ghost to work/live near his parents. There were other friends to pass the time, they just seemed to have no qualms over their lot in a place I felt had no future. I decided then I would return to Milwaukee sometime in early 1994. First I needed to save up a nest egg to buffer the long streak of unemployment. I had been living with my grandmother for a couple months (not by choice), thus I would only need to scrimp for another six months; how wrong naive I was. I can’t recall what were the other parts of the plan. I only knew the situation in Bloomington was untenable.
Good thing I shared my idea with Doc a couple weeks later. He convinced me to gamble on Austin instead. The rest is history.
Back to Helen’s birthday. If you know her, drop her a line. If you don’t, I’m sure you still can send some good vibes her way. Helen has endured knowing me for 22 years, that’s worth a few pounds of karma.
I didn’t intend this post to be so twisted around myself. I wanted to share how Helen’s birthday has a specific place in my memory and mind.