Happy Birthday, Shannon!

Today is my good friend Shannon's birthday. I remember her birthday because it is exactly three days prior to mine (round of applause for the subtlety of the delivery of that shameless hint?!). Anyway, Shannon and I go way back. All the way back to freshman year of high school, where we met in the band (was it Mr. Schmidt?) and at the lunch table of "misfits". Okay, okay, maybe not misfits. But I was new. I had attended private school for 8 years, and here I was thrown into the local public school for high school (my choice, btw). I knew some of the kids from youth group at church and from sports teams, but nobody else! So the first day for lunch, I saw a table of girls that were wearing sort of what I was wearing, and had their hair sort of like mine, and I took a chance. I found a table of great friends that day - not misfits at all. Just different from most of the other cliquish types; the hair, the makeup, the captain of the football team on your arm, nor the other extreme: the goths. No, the girls I met marched to the beat of their own drummer, and many of us stayed friends for the whole 4 years. But one stands out, and that's my friend, Shannon. We've had our ups and downs over the years. For a long time we had stopped speaking over something heartless I said, but she contacted me out of the blue years later and I'm so glad she did. We've moved on with our lives - we both married a man named Mark, we both have kids. She lives in St. Louis. But we call, we email. We tell each other things we probably don't tell anyone else. And we sometimes share stories and reminisce about those high school days, oh my. Band camp. Steve. Scott. Craig. The twins. Shannon, if you're reading this, I know you're smiling right now! Have a great birthday!