Tag: relationship

October 22-23, 1998.  A party at the De Anza house, and a familiar face from the past. (#196)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 6 Comments

I rode my bike south on Andrews Road toward campus.  I had an hour before my class started, but I would rather sit around on campus than at home, and I also felt like having a couple slices of the really good pizza that they made at the student-run Coffee House for lunch.  I enjoyed feeling the warmth of the sun on me as I pedaled the familiar route, especially knowing that its time was limited.  Late October in Jeromeville was very pleasant weather, with a high temperature of around 75 degrees today, but if this year was anything like the previous four years I had spent in Jeromeville, the weather would suddenly get cold and possibly rainy a few weeks from now.

I parked my bike at the Quad, locked it, picked up a copy of today’s Daily Colt campus newspaper and read the front page as I stood in line for pizza.  When I sat at a table with my food a few minutes later, I saw Eddie Baker walking toward me.  “Hey, Greg,” Eddie said.  “How’s it going?”

“Good,” I replied.  “You?”

“I’m good.  Meeting with some of the Bible study leaders later, but I got here early.”

Eddie graduated in June, as did I.  This year he was working part time on staff with Jeromeville Christian Fellowship, a chapter of a national organization called Intervarsity.  Dave McAllen and his wife Janet were the head staff of JCF; I assumed that this was the Dave that he would be meeting.

He continued, “Shouldn’t you be in Nueces student teaching now?”

“I’m just there for the first three periods, until 10:58.  Then I come back home.  I have a class on campus today at 1.”

“I see.  How’s teaching going?”

“Not bad.  One of the students got suspended this week.”

“Wow.  What did he do?”

“I’m not sure exactly, but I heard the master teacher say it was drug related.”

“Dang.  How old are these kids again?”

“High school.  He’s a junior.  But taking geometry, which is normally for sophomores, so already he isn’t exactly the best student.”

“Yeah.  Do your students like you?”

“Some do, some don’t, I guess.”

“That makes sense.  I was thinking earlier, are you all serious, or do you ever joke around with the students?  I had a teacher in high school who joked around a lot.  He was really funny.”

“I’m still figuring out what is and isn’t ok to do.  But I joke around a little.  Like last week was Homecoming, and for some reason they did something where the nominees for Homecoming Court had to do silly things.  One day they weren’t allowed to talk, and if a teacher called on them, they had to act things out and answer without talking.  And two of the nominees were in my class, so I called on them as often as I could.  At least until they got really tired of it.

“That’s great,” Eddie replied, laughing.  “Hey, I wanted to tell you, Friday after JCF people are hanging out at our house.  You’re invited.”

“Oh,” I said.  “Thanks!  Yeah, I’ll be there!  That sounds like fun!”


I was excited the following night on my way to JCF.  Of course, I should be excited about JCF every week, because I got to worship God with over a hundred other University of Jeromeville students, and I got to learn about the Bible.  But I had to admit that this week felt more exciting than usual because of Eddie’s party afterward.  I had made a lot of great friends in the three years since I first got involved with JCF, but I also often felt slightly on the outside of the cliques that formed within the group.  Knowing in advance about something social happening afterward gave me one less thing to worry about this week.

This year, JCF met in the large lecture hall at 2101 Harding Hall.  I walked in and looked around for a seat.  I arrived early enough that there were plenty of empty seats.  As I looked around, something registered in my mind as being out of place.  It took me a few seconds to process what I saw, after which I did a double take and looked again, because the whole scene was confusing the more I thought about it.

Haley Channing stood across the room from me, talking to Tabitha Sasaki.  Haley was accompanied by a middle-aged man whom I was pretty sure was her father.  I had met Mr. Channing once before, a couple years ago when Haley’s parents came to visit for the weekend of the Spring Picnic.  This was shortly after I met Haley, before her mother passed.  Also with them was a skinny sandy-haired freshman boy named Brennan, whom I had seen around JCF this year but never actually spoken to.

Why was Haley here?  She graduated.  She moved back home, hundreds of miles away.  Apparently she was up here visiting, which made sense because she still knew people in Jeromeville.  Tabitha, for example. But why was she talking to Brennan?  He and Haley did not go to JCF at the same time; Brennan was a freshman, and Haley graduated last spring before Brennan started here.  Did they know each other from somewhere else, or did Haley just meet Brennan tonight?  And why was Haley’s father here?  He had probably met some of Haley’s Jeromeville friends over the years, but would he really travel that far with Haley on what was likely at least an overnight trip just to see his daughter’s friends?  Haley had an older brother who graduated two years ahead of us, and I know he still lived in Jeromeville last year.  Maybe Haley’s brother still lived in Jeromeville, and Mr. Channing came up to see him too.  Maybe he just wanted to get away for a weekend.  It had been two years since Mrs. Channing passed, and grief hits people in unexpected ways sometime.

I sat down and decided not to go talk to Haley right away.  Maybe later, but not right now.  I did not want to interrupt whatever Haley and the people around her were talking about.   I had been called out for that before; once at JCF when her mother had recently passed, she was talking to her friends, I asked what was wrong, and I was told later that it was weird how I kept trying to talk to her.  It would be better to wait for the right time.  After all, everything was going to feel weird with Haley around, and it was none of my business why her father was here or how she knew Brennan.

Not necessarily, I told myself.  I had no reason to feel weird around Haley.  Sure, she did not like me back, she did not feel the same way about me as I felt about her, but we had coexisted peacefully at JCF for a year and a half after that conversation, until she moved away last summer.  I had no reason to believe things would be any different today than how they were during that time of peacefully coexisting.

At the end of the night, after the worship and message ended, I wandered in the general direction of where Haley and her father were, saying hi to a few others along the way.  While I did not want to interrupt or try too hard, I did not want to be completely aloof either.  Haley’s pretty blue eyes looked up at me as I approached, and she smiled.  “Greg!” she exclaimed.  “How are you?”

“Pretty good.  It’s good to see you again.”

“You’ve met my dad right?”

“Yes,” I said.  Mr. Channing gestured to shake my hand, and I shook back.

Haley then gestured toward Brennan and asked, “Have you met my brother, Brennan?”

Brennan was Haley’s younger brother!  That explained so much!  Haley’s father was up here visiting his son, newly away at school, and Haley came along for the ride since she still had friends in Jeromeville from her time here.  “I’ve seen him around, but I didn’t know he was your brother.”

“Brennan, this is Greg.  He was in my year, and he’s still in Jeromeville, student teaching now.  Right, Greg?”

“Yeah,” I replied.

“Nice to meet you,” Brennan said, shaking my hand.

“How’s teaching going?” Haley asked.  “Are you actually teaching the class, or just helping out?  How does it work?”

“It’s going pretty well.  I’m mostly just helping out now, but the two master teachers I’m working with are going to gradually let me start teaching lessons soon.  By January I’ll be doing most of the teaching myself.”

“What classes?  And which school?  I forget.”

“Geometry and Basic Math B, at Nueces High.”

“So you drive from Jeromeville to Nueces every day?”

“Yeah.  I’m there for the first three periods, then I come back here and have education classes at UJ in the afternoon.”

“That’s great!”

I looked at Brennan again, then back to Haley, and said, “So all three siblings in your family ended up going to Jeromeville?”

“Yeah!  Ever since Brennan and I visited Christian when he was a freshman, we both really liked it!”

“It’s worked out well for our family,” Mr. Channing added.  “We had dinner with Christian before this, and we’ll see him again tomorrow.”

“That’s good.”

“Are you going to the party at the De Anza house tonight?” Haley asked.

“Yeah!  Will I see you there?”

“Yes.  We’re gonna take Dad back to the hotel in a bit, then head over there.”

“Sounds good.”


I lingered around Harding Hall to talk to as many people as I could after JCF.  I was one of the last to leave, so when I finally arrived at Eddie’s house on De Anza Drive in north Jeromeville, the party was already packed.  I saw many of the JCF regulars there, along with a significant number of people I did not know.  I assumed that many of the people I did not know were freshman or new transfer students who had just begun attending JCF this quarter.  I had not met all of the new students.

The De Anza house had a large living room with couches and a television in front.  A stairway to the right of the front door led upstairs to four bedrooms, and a long dining and family room extended across the back of the house.  A dining room table and another couch were in that room, along with a foosball table.  A few minutes after I walked in, I heard shouting coming from the back.  I headed in the direction of the shouting and saw Brent Wang and Todd Chevallier on one side of the foosball table and Colin Bowman and Andrew Bryant on the other side. Colin and Andrew each had their pants down around their ankles, playing in T-shirts and boxer shorts.  “What is going on?” I asked.

Jason Costello, one of the housemates who lived at the house, pointed to the score counters and explained, “House rule.  If you go down seven to nothing, you have to drop your pants.”

“Okay,” I said, shaking my head.  Kind of silly, and inappropriate, but typical of things that male university students might come up with.

I wandered around for a few minutes, saying hi to people, asking what they were doing, and answering their inevitable questions about my student teaching.  About half an hour after I got there, Eddie asked me if I wanted to play Mafia.  I excitedly said yes and walked toward the couch at the far end of the back room where the Mafia game was forming.  I had played this game a few times both with friends from JCF and with the youth group at church.  In the game, led by a narrator who was not playing, three players would secretly be chosen as the Mafia, the doctor, and the detective.  Some people played with two Mafia, especially in large groups, but for this game we only had one. In each round, with no one looking or knowing, the Mafia would secretly choose a person to assassinate. Then the doctor would secretly choose a person to revive, attempting to guess who had been assassinated. Finally, the detective would secretly choose one person, and the narrator would silently communicate to the detective whether or not that person was Mafia.  The living players would then discuss and choose to accuse someone of being Mafia. The accused player would be executed, eliminated from the game, and if this player was not in fact Mafia, the process would repeat until the killer had been correctly identified, or until the killer had killed everyone.

John Harvey, one of the other housemates here who, like Eddie, was on staff part time with JCF, was the narrator.  He passed out face down slips of paper with the roles randomly written on them. I discreetly looked at my paper; I had no special role.

John stood in the middle of the players, who formed a rough circle.  Seth Huang, Ellie Jo Raymond, and Autumn Davies were squeezed onto the couch with me.  Todd Chevallier, no longer playing foosball, sat in a recliner.  Eddie sat on one of three chairs that he had brought over from the dining room table, with the other two occupied by girls I did not know, probably freshmen.  One of them still had her name tag from JCF on; it said “Stacie.”  Haley and Brennan sat on the floor, along with Ajeet Tripathi, Leah Eckert, Tim Walton, and Brianna Johns.

I closed my eyes with everyone else as John asked each of the people in special roles to make their selections, one at a time.  When I opened my eyes with the others, John said, “Greg!  You have been assassinated.  And the doctor was unable to revive you.”

That was a quick game for me, I thought.  I had no further role in this game, but I could watch the proceedings.  And I was curious to know who had picked me to go out first.  The other players threw out various speculative theories of who was responsible, with none of them drawing much of a reaction until Ellie Jo pointed at Autumn and said, “Autumn has been awfully quiet through all of this.”

“What? Me?” Autumn exclaimed.

“You’re right,” Eddie said.  “She has.  I think it’s Autumn.”

“I would never hurt Greg!  Greg is my friend, and I’m, well, shaken up at his death.”  Autumn gestured as if she were holding back tears, but it was easy to see that she was not actually crying, since she was also holding back laughter.  “These accusations against me are the last thing I need in this time of tragedy!” she exclaimed.

“It’s totally Autumn,” Ajeet concurred.

“Are you ready to vote?” John asked.  Autumn continued trying to defend herself and clear her name, but everyone else wanted to vote.  “Three, two, one, go!” John said.  As John said “go,” Autumn pointed at Ellie Jo, and everyone else pointed at Autumn.

John said, “Autumn is not the Mafia.  Put your heads down.”  Everyone groaned, with some making expressions of surprise.  Since Autumn and I were out of the game, we were no longer required to put our heads down.  When John called for the mafia to awaken and choose the next victim, Stacie opened her eyes and smiled.  I was not expecting Stacie to be the killer, although I knew nothing about how she operated in games like this since I did not know her.  She pointed at Eddie.  Tim was the doctor, and he pointed at Ellie Jo.  Ajeet was the detective; he pointed at Brianna, and John shook his head no.

“Everyone, wake up,” John announced.  “Eddie, you were murdered in the night.”

“Me?” Eddie said incredulously.  “What did I do?”

John shrugged.  “I don’t know, but you can’t talk.  You’re dead.”

Everyone looked around, trying to figure out who could be responsible.  Todd spoke up after a few seconds.  “Okay, hear me out.  I have a theory.  Let’s look at this.  Who did the Mafia take out first?  Greg.  And then Eddie.  These were not random victims.  Greg and Eddie graduated.  They have degrees.  They’re going to be powerful and influential in this game.  Who else would target the people with degrees?  Someone who also has a degree and knows these two well.  And the only other person here with a degree is Haley.”

“No!” Haley replied, laughing.  “It wasn’t me!  These two were in my year!  We’ve been through so much together!  I’m not going to murder them!”

“That sounds like something that you would say if you were secretly in the Mafia,” Stacie suggested.

“Yeah!  She’s right!”  Ajeet shouted.  Others shouted concurring sentiments.

“I think we’re ready to vote,” Todd told John.  John counted down, and most of the surviving players pointed at Haley.

“Haley is not Mafia,” John said.  “Put your heads down.”

The game continued for several more rounds.  Ajeet was the next to be targeted, and since he was the detective, that conveniently eliminated the possibility of the detective learning who the killer was, and using that to sway the discussion.  No one ever suspected Stacie, and she ended up winning, successfully eliminating everyone without ever getting voted out herself.  Todd, the last player eliminated, said, “Really?  It was Stacie?”

“It was,” Stacie replied.  “And I fooled all of you.”

“So taking out Greg and Eddie first?  That was just coincidence?” Todd asked.

“Yeah.  I didn’t know they graduated.  Just a lucky guess.”

“Well played,” I told Stacie.  “Good game.”

“Thanks,” she replied.


The drive home from the De Anza house only took a few minutes, since my house was only about a mile away.  I did not leave until almost one in the morning; by then, the party had wound down, and most of the guests had left.  As I drove home in the cold, clear night, my thoughts were on Haley.  I thought about what could have been, what might have happened had things gone differently two years ago.  Then, as I pulled up to the red light to make a left turn onto Andrews Road, I made myself remember that this was not meant to be, and that it was pointless to think about it now.  I tried making myself think about other things, but my mind was back on Haley by the time I got home and went to bed.

I never saw her again after that night, and as is often the case when I have just seen someone for the last time, I did not realize at the time that it was the last time I would see her.  Back in 1998, people had to make much more effort to stay connected than they do now.  She never specifically mentioned wanting to stay in contact with me, and I did not feel comfortable asking her for her contact information, given our history.  It might make me look desperate trying too hard to stay in touch with someone who rejected me.  At some point in the 2010s, I saw her on Facebook where it suggests people you may know, and I recognized her even though she had a different last name.  I did not try to contact her.  If she were ever to initiate contact with me, I would accept, since she was my friend in the past.  But I still do not feel right reaching out to her, for the same reasons as before.

I did not understand it then, but growing apart from people is just a natural part of life, and there is not much I can do about it.  Not everyone was meant to be a part of my life forever, nor was I meant to be part of everyone else’s lives forever.  Haley would not be part of my life going forward, not romantically, not platonically, and at some point, I came to make peace with that.  I would make new friends.  Some of them would become part of my life forever, and others would pass out of my life a few years later just as Haley did.

Readers: Have you ever had a former love interest or significant other show up somewhere unexpected? How did that go? Tell me about it in the comments.

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August 16, 1998.  Josh and Abby’s wedding, and two birthdays. (#189)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 10 Comments

“Bride or groom’s side?” the usher asked.  I knew quite a few guests attending this wedding, but I did not know this usher.

“I know both,” I said as I heard people approach behind me.  “I’m not sure which side I should be on.

Apparently one of the people approaching behind me was Taylor Santiago, because next I heard his voice say, “Come sit with us!”

“Okay,” I said.  I followed Taylor to a row in the middle of the church where Noah Snyder, Cambria Hawley, Erica Foster, Sasha Travis, Brody Parker, and Martin Rhodes were sitting, on the groom’s side, along with Adam White, the youth pastor here at Jeromeville Covenant Church.  I knew Abby and Josh through several different connections, most notably that Josh and I had been roommates for two years, but all of these connections ultimately led back to church and to Jeromeville Christian Fellowship.  The two of them had been leaders with the junior high group, along with me and the others I was sitting with.  Abby and Josh were going to switch to the high school group for next year, though, because both of them were close with students who would be starting high school.

Dan Keenan, the college pastor at J-Cov, began speaking about God’s divine and holy purposes for marriage.  Dan’s Sunday school teaching, and his sermons when he occasionally preached on Sundays, often followed some kind of acronym.  Since Abby and Josh were avid snowboarders, Dan explained four important keys to a Godly marriage using the acronym S-N-O-W.

I started to get bored about ten minutes into Dan’s sermon, so I looked around the room.  I recognized many faces, but I did not know everyone at this wedding.  Abby and Josh each had friends from before they came to Jeromeville, as well as people who they met from places other than church, and family members.  Weddings were still a new experience for me.  I attended a couple of weddings of relatives as a young child, then none for many years, but this was now my second wedding right here at J-Cov in less than two months.  I was now twenty-two years old, with a number of my friends in very serious relationships or engaged, so I expected that I would be going to many more weddings over the next couple of years.  And while I was happy for Abby and Josh, they were perfect for each other, I was finding weddings to be boring and unrelatable to me.  I had never had a girlfriend, I had never been in love, I had never come close to anything like this happening to me.  I had no frame of reference for what it was like to be pledging my life to be committed to someone in love.

After Pastor Dan’s sermon, Josh and Abby recited vows to each other and exchanged rings.  At Scott and Amelia Madison’s wedding, the one I had been to earlier this summer, one of the groomsmen stepped out and played sound effects of metal being forged, then returned with the ring.  Nothing silly happened with Josh and Abby’s ring presentation, though.  Dan pronounced the couple husband and wife, and everyone stood and clapped as Josh and Abby walked down the center aisle.

“How’s it goin’, Greg?” Noah asked once the newlyweds had left the room.  “Happy birthday, by the way!”

“Yeah, man!” Taylor added.  “Happy birthday!”

“I forgot it was your birthday!” Cambria said.  “Did you do anything exciting?”

“Today’s your birthday?” Sasha asked.  “Isn’t it Abby’s birthday too?  I heard someone say she was getting married on her birthday.”

“My birthday was yesterday,” I explained.  “I didn’t really do anything.  I was at my parents’ house last week, so they took me to dinner the night before I left to come back here.”

“Well, happy birthday!” Sasha replied.

“And you were right, it is Abby’s birthday today.  I’m one day older than her.”

“I think that would be kind of weird, getting married on my birthday.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because then my birthday would also be my anniversary, and I wouldn’t get a special day anymore.  I’d have to share it with my husband.”

“I guess that makes sense,” I said.  “But on the other hand, that means Josh is never going to forget Abby’s birthday.”

“He better not forget his wife’s birthday anyway, whatever day it is.”

“True.”


This wedding and the Madisons’ were the only ones I had been to as an adult, so I naturally found myself comparing the two wedding ceremonies and receptions in my mind as the day went on.  As I drove from the church to the reception, I kept expecting this reception to be significantly scaled down compared to the Madison wedding two months earlier.  Both wedding ceremonies were at Jeromeville Covenant Church, but the Madisons’ reception was on the other side of the Drawbridge, in a fancy ballroom in downtown Capital City.  Abby and Josh had rented the much simpler, and geographically closer, Jeromeville Veterans Memorial Hall.  I had been past that building many times in my car and on my bike, but I never knew what was inside.

The Veterans Memorial Hall was on 15th Street, less than a mile from the church.  It was part of a large park that included sports fields, a playground, a public swimming pool, and the place where people gathered every Fourth of July to watch fireworks.  Jeromeville High School was right next to the Veterans Memorial Hall.  I parked in the attached parking lot, between the park and the school, and walked inside.  It appeared that this building was just a community center that the city parks department rented out for events; the “Veterans Memorial” name referred to a series of plaques on the outside wall of the building listing names of Jeromevillians who died in foreign wars.  The main room was full of folding tables and chairs.  The tables were covered with plain white tablecloths and simple centerpieces with flowers.  As I suspected, this was less fancy than the Madisons’ reception, but this did not bother me at all.

I was about to sit at a table close to the long table where it appeared the food would be served until I noticed someone else’s name at the table.  I walked around trying to find my name until I remembered that everyone’s table assignment might be listed somewhere.  I returned to the entrance and found the list of table assignments, then walked to my table, at the complete opposite end of the room from the food table.  I was the first one to sit down at my table, and looking at the other name cards on the table, I deduced that Abby and Josh had arranged the seats intentionally, so that the wedding guests who knew each other would be sitting together as  much as possible.  The other youth group leaders, the same ones I sat with at the ceremony, were all at my table.  Sasha’s name card was at my table, but not directly next to me.  Hopefully I would still get a chance to talk to her

Since neither Sasha nor any of the others at my table had arrived yet, I walked around the room.  The other early arrivals included a few people I knew from church, so I spent a few minutes catching up with them.  I also looked around at the decorations.  On one wall was a bulletin board with the title “JOSHUA & ABIGAIL” spelled out on top, covered with photographs.  Pictures of Josh’s childhood adorned the left side of the bulletin board, pictures of Abby’s childhood on the right, and pictures of the two of them together in the center.  Josh and Abby were an outdoors-loving couple, and many of the pictures of them together depicted them hiking, camping, or snowboarding.  A guestbook was on a table next to the photos; I signed it.

By the time I got back to my table, Noah, Cambria, Erica, and Sasha had arrived.  “Hey,” I said as I returned to the table.

“So when does student teaching start?” Noah asked.  “High schools start earlier than UJ, so do you have to start when the school starts?”

“Yeah,” I replied.  “A week from Monday, I have to go to the teacher meetings and some training that comes with the textbook.  Then the first day of school is the 31st.”

“And do your classes back at Jeromeville start then too?”

“Only the weekly seminar where the math students teachers meet and discuss things specific to math.  The other classes I have to take follow the university schedule.”

“I see.  Are you excited?”

“Excited.  And nervous.  I don’t really know what to expect.  But this is what I’m doing with my life now, so that part of it is exciting,” I explained.

Taylor and Martin had arrived while I was talking to Noah.  “What school are you at?” Martin asked.

“Nueces High,” I answered.  “Same school where Josh will be working.”

“Josh?” Sasha asked.  “This Josh?  He’s working at Nueces High?”

“Yes.  Josh finished his student teaching last year, and he got hired at Nueces High, to teach science.  So I’m going to know someone else on the faculty.”

“That’ll be fun for you two!”

“I know,” I said.  I tried to think of something else to say; I wanted to continue talking to Sasha.  She wore a black dress, slightly more formal than what I was used to her wearing, but otherwise she looked the same as she always did, with long, straight, brown hair and glasses over somewhat flattened facial features.  Sasha was not drop-dead gorgeous in the usual sense, but there was something charming and cute about her when combined with her enthusiastic yet slightly sassy personality.  “So how’s your summer going, Sasha?” I asked.  “How do you like being done with high school?”

“It’s nice,” Sasha replied.  “I’m mostly looking forward to moving out in a couple weeks!  And I won’t have to live in a dorm with other freshmen.”

“That’ll be nice, although my dorm experience wasn’t all that bad.  That’s where I met Taylor, remember.”  I gestured collectively toward Sasha, Erica, and Cambria, and said, “You three will be living together?  And Courtney and another girl I don’t know?  Is that right?”

“Yes!  It’s gonna be so much fun?”

“What?” Cambria asked.  “Did someone say my name?”

“I was just talking with Sasha about your apartment next year,” I explained.

“I’m excited!  You’re gonna be in the same house next year, but with different roommates, right?  Obviously Josh won’t be there, since he’s married now.”

“Yeah.  Sean and I are still there, and Brody and Jed Wallace are moving in.  And Josh and Abby got an apartment in south Jeromeville, on Cornell Boulevard.  This is the first year since I started at UJ that I won’t be moving.”

“That’ll be nice.”


The master of ceremonies introduced Josh and Abby some time later.  Josh led the wedding guests in a prayer for the meal, and the guests were dismissed one table at a time to get food.  Each table had already been served bread and butter for an appetizer, and I had long since devoured more than my share of my table’s bread.  I was ready to eat, but it appeared that my table would not be dismissed for a while.

The meal was chicken, salad, and some kind of pasta.  It was not bad, but not really my usual kind of meal.  “When I get married, I’m going to have my wedding catered by In-N-Out Burger,” I commented.

“I don’t think your future wife would want that,” Taylor said.

“Well, then,” I explained, “if she doesn’t, then she isn’t the one for me.”

“I don’t think it works like that.”

“Why not?  If I’m going to marry someone, we need to have things in common.”

“Yeah, but your love of In-N-Out Burger isn’t really one of those essential things.  Especially when you’re planning a wedding.  You have to compromise on some things,” Taylor explained.

“Greg does have a point, though” Brody countered.  “It’s important to have things in common.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling humorously vindicated.

As the guests ate, Josh and Abby wandered among the tables, talking to their friends and family.  When it was my turn, Abby greeted me with an enthusiastic “Greg!” and Josh shook my hand, saying, “Hey, buddy.”

“Congratulations,” I said.  Then, turning to Abby, I added, “And happy birthday.”

“Thank you!” she replied.  “Didn’t you just have a birthday too?”

“It was yesterday.”

“Happy birthday!  Are we the same age?  Twenty-two?”

“Yes.  I’m one day older than you.  And now Josh will never forget your birthday, because it’s his anniversary too.”

“I know!  We need to get around to the other tables, but we’ll talk to you soon.”

“Yes.”  Turning to Josh, I added, “And Josh, I’ll see you at work a week from Monday.”

“Yeah!” Josh replied.  “For sure!  Are you ready for student teaching?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be, I guess.”


After dinner, the master of ceremonies invited members of the wedding party to toast the new couple.  Although I knew a lot of people at this wedding, most of the wedding party was made up of people whom Abby and Josh had grown up with.  The only person in the wedding party whom I knew was Sam Hoffman, Josh’s friend who had also lived at our house last year.  Sam and Josh were both physics majors, so most of Sam’s toast consisted of stories about late nights studying and working in the lab together.

Next, it was time to cut the cake.  The guests stood and gathered around the table with the cake.  Sasha got up a few seconds before I did, so I followed her and stood next to her.  She turned around when she heard me approach.  “Hi,” she said.

“Hi,” I replied.

“I was going to tell you earlier.  I really like your tie.”

“Thanks,” I said, smiling and blushing a little.  I was wearing the only tie I had; it was red, with dark blue diagonal stripes outlined in white.  When I graduated in June, I did not have a tie to wear with the shirt I wore under my graduation gown.  I had the clip-on bow tie that came with my tuxedo that I got for chorus performances, but Mom said that was too formal for graduation, so she brought one of Grandpa’s ties.  “It belonged to my grandfather,” I explained.

“Well, I’m sure he would have thought you were handsome.”

After Sasha said that, I realized that I had worded my statement awkwardly.  “He’s still alive,” I said.

“Oh!” Sasha replied.  “Then I’m sure he would find you handsome if he were here today.”

“Thank you.” I smiled as Josh and Abby took their pieces of cake and carefully moved their hands up to feed each other.  Abby smashed her cake in Josh’s face, and Josh did the same a split second later.  The guests cheered.  I did not.  “I don’t like this tradition of smashing the cake in each other’s face,” I said.

“But it’s fun!” Sasha replied.

“It’s your wedding!  It’s a serious event, and a solemn covenant before God.  And you’re supposed to trust your spouse, not mess up each other’s faces on your big day.”

“It’s not that big a deal!  Weddings can be fun!”

“I guess,” I said.

Josh and Abby wiped down their cake-stained faces as the master of ceremonies announced that it was time for the first dance.  It was a slow song which I had never heard before, but the voice and musical style were sufficiently familiar for me to guess that it was a song by Toad the Wet Sprocket.  Josh was a huge fan of that band and played their music in the living room sometimes when we lived together last year.  Before I met Josh, I already knew a few of their songs from hearing them on the radio.

A little later, the master of ceremonies announced that the dance floor was open to guests.  I had no interest in dancing to the clichéd pop songs typical of wedding receptions, but after a few of those songs, the disc jockey started playing swing music.  Swing dancing had become a huge nationwide fad over the last year, and while it took me a while to get on board, I had enjoyed learning swing dancing over the last couple months.  I turned to Sasha and asked, “Would you like to dance?”

“I would!” she replied.  I led her to the dance floor arm in arm and began dancing with her, enjoying the music and enjoying her smile.  At one point in the song, I turned her in a slightly different way than usual.  Matthew, who taught the swing dancing lesson at the University Bar & Grill, had taught this move last week, and I practiced it with everyone I danced with that night.  This was the first time I had done this move with Sasha.

“That’s a new one!” Sasha exclaimed, smiling.  “I like that!”

“Thank you,” I replied.  I did the same move two more times with Sasha later in that song, and I dipped her low into my arms on the final beat.

“You’re getting a lot better!” she said as we walked off the dance floor.

“Thank you!  Will you be at the U-Bar tonight after the wedding?”

“I will!  Will you?”

“Yes.  I’ll probably miss the lesson, but I was going to head over there as soon as this is over.  Save me another dance there?”

“Of course!”


Sasha did save me a dance at the U-Bar that night.  Two, in fact.  I kept doing that turn that she complimented until I realized that I probably should not keep repeating the same move over and over again.  I had a sense that nothing would ever happen between Sasha and me.  I was not popular with girls, and she was only eighteen, probably too young for me.  But I hoped I was wrong about that.

Grandpa never asked for his tie back, and I still have it today.  Once I started buying my own ties, I stopped wearing Grandpa’s as often.  As far as I can remember, no one else ever complimented me on that specific tie that way.

As I lay in bed that night waiting to drift off to sleep, I thought back on all that had happened today.  This was a milestone of sorts in my life, the first time I had been to a wedding of someone who was younger than me.  Josh was twenty-five, though, so it was not true that both people getting married were younger.  That milestone would not come for another two and a half years, at Liz Wlliams and Ramon Quintero’s wedding.  Liz and Ramon were barely younger than me, though; all of us were born in the same year, but I was a couple months older than either of them.  Liz and Ramon also went to J-Cov, but they were not at Abby and Josh’s wedding today; neither of them was in Jeromeville this summer.

Sasha enjoyed seeing the couple smash cake in each other’s faces at weddings.  If things did work out between Sasha and me, she would probably want to smash cake in my face at our wedding.  I most definitely did not want this.  But at this point, I felt willing to compromise on this one little moment of one day if it meant getting to be with Sasha for the rest of my life.  I might even be persuaded to find a real caterer instead of In-N-Out Burger.  As I fell asleep that night, I kept thinking about Sasha’s cute smile and giggle as she smashed a piece of wedding cake in my face.

Readers: What are your thoughts about smashing the cake in each other’s faces at a wedding? Or any other wedding traditions? Let me know in the comments!

If you like what you read, don’t forget to like this post and follow this blog. Also follow Don’t Let The Days Go By on Facebook and Instagram.

June 8 – July 14, 1998.  Emailing Casey. (#185)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 5 Comments

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Mon, 08 Jun 1998 22:22 -0500
Subject: hi!

Hi, Greg!  I just wanted to say I found your website.  It’s so cool!  I laughed at the part with your favorite jokes!  I hadn’t heard most of them before!  Then I saw the link to that Dog Crap thing… that’s you too?  You make those stories and pictures?  That’s so creative!

Anyway, I just wanted to say hi!  Write me back if you can!

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

Hello… so how did you find my page exactly?  Honestly, I forgot that the home page and the jokes were still up… I made that two years ago when I was first teaching myself the basics of HTML.  I found a website that had an HTML tutorial, and regular jeromeville.edu accounts can’t host Web sites but math department ones can.  But I’m glad you found Dog Crap and Vince.  That’s my big creative project right now.  I better get back to work… are you in school, and if so, are you on summer break?  Your address looks like a school email.

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 21:38 -0500
Subject: Re: hi!

Thanks for writing back!  I found your page because I love watching the Bay City Captains and I was looking for other Captains fans!  I live in Texas now, but I grew up in East Bayside.  We moved here when I was 12.  I should probably tell you a little about myself!  First, I’m a girl.  Casey is more common as a guy’s name, but my parents liked the name for either a boy or a girl, and they had me!  I’m 19, I just finished my first year at Texas North Community College, studying psych.  I’m going to transfer somewhere next year, hopefully, but I haven’t decided for sure where I want to go.  I work part time at a coffee shop.  Where do you go to school?  What classes are you taking?  Any plans for the weekend?  I’ll talk to you soon!  Bye for now!

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

Wow… that’s impressive, staying a Captains fan in the middle of Texas surrounded by Toros fans.  It would drive me crazy.  I can’t stand the Toros.  A few years ago, when the Captains and Toros played each other for the championship, that was when I first started talking to people online, and one of the first people I met was from Texas.  During the game that year, I was nice and didn’t try to be a jerk about it.  After the Captains came from behind and won, I checked my email, and I had one from her bragging about the Toros being ahead at halftime.  I replied, “So how’d that work out for you?”

Good to know you’re a girl… when I got your email, my first thought was who’s this Casey guy?  Anyway, where in Texas are you?  I’m about to graduate from the University of Jeromeville (do you know where that is?  Next to Capital City, about an hour and a half northeast of East Bayside), and I’m doing the teacher training program here next year.  I want to teach high school math.  My degree is in math, and that was always my favorite subject.  I’m 21, almost 22.  Dog Crap and Vince is my creative hobby; you’ve seen that.  I probably spend too much time talking to random people I meet online, but some of them have become real friends.  Looks like I just made another one. :)  I also like bike rides and board games.  My friend Pete recently taught me this new game called Settlers of Catan; have you played that?  My friends and I have been playing that a lot this summer.  I’m also involved with a Christian student group, and I’m a youth group leader at my church.  Do you go to church?  Do you play any sports or just like to watch football?

You saw my picture on my Web site, but what do you look like?  I’m just curious.  I’m not doing anything this weekend, just studying because finals are coming up next week.  What are you up to?

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Mon, 15 Jun 1998 20:44 -0500
Subject: Re: hi!

Hi!  Guess what… I just got my nose pierced!  Nothing too flashy, just a little stud.  I think it looks so cute!  Do you have any piercings or anything like that?  Let’s see… what do I look like… I’m 5’5”, 130lbs, with dark reddish-brown hair and blue eyes.  I don’t have a scanner, but I think there’s one in the school library I can use so I can scan my picture and send it to you.  I play soccer, I have for as long as I can remember.  I’m a midfielder… I love it!  I’m not playing on an organized team right now.  I tried out for our school team but I didn’t make it.  I didn’t think I was going to.  I was on a recreational team with some friends earlier this year, but we’re not playing right now.  Do you play any sports?  That’s hilarious what you told your friend in Texas!  I would have been rubbing it in so much after she got cocky like that and then the Toros ended up losing!  I had a bet with my friend Jessica on that game, and I won $10!  I’m in Denton, just north of Dallas and Fort Worth.  I like it here, but I also like when we go visit my grandparents in East Bayside every couple years.  It’s nice there.  That’s so cool that you’re a youth group leader!  That always looked fun!  We go to a Baptist church.  I’m not really involved with any groups there.  What’s your church like?  Also, how is this finals week for you?  Why do you get out so much later than we do?  Is it summer school or something?  I’ll talk to you soon!

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

Your nose ring sounds cute :)

I don’t have any piercings.  I’ve never really wanted any.  A lot of people around here do, though.  Jeromeville is a countercultural college town.

I don’t play any sports.  I played tee-ball when I was 6, and all I remember is that I thought it was boring because we didn’t keep score, and the coach made me cry but I don’t remember why.  In high school, a lot of my friends told me I should play football, so I worked out with the football team the summer after freshman year.  I was more of a student than an athlete, so I also read books about football and learned a lot about strategies, positions, rules, the history of football, things like that.  I only lasted one day of practice, but the experience of taking the time to learn about football has given me a greater appreciation for watching the game.  In addition to watching the Captains on TV, I also go to football games at UJ sometimes.  Basketball too.  My brother got all the sports talent in our family.  He has played baseball and basketball all his life.

I go to an Evangelical Covenant church.  I grew up Catholic, but I had a lot of friends freshman year who encouraged me to take my faith more seriously.  I eventually started going to their church, because it seemed more like what I was looking for.

Do you still live with your family?  How many siblings do you have?  I just have the one brother.  He’s younger, he’s 16 and going to be a junior in high school.  My family lives in Plumdale, near Santa Lucia and Gabilan.  That’s about a two and a half hour drive from here.  I usually only go home on school breaks.  Do you have a boyfriend?  Just wondering.

Sorry it took a while for me to write back.  I was busy, but I’m done with finals now.  To answer your question, UJ is on the three-quarter schedule, so we have three terms during the year instead of two.  Winter break comes after the first term, 1/3 of the way through the year, so to make that work we start at the end of September and get out in the middle of June.  You get out earlier than we do, but you probably also go back earlier.  I need to get going.  I’m going with some friends to see the new X-Files movie today.  We watch the show together every week during the season, but the show is off for the summer now.  Do you watch X-Files?  What else do you have planned for the weekend?  I have graduation tomorrow!  Talk to you soon!

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Sat, 20 Jun 1998 11:06 -0500
Subject: Re: hi!

Your coach made you cry?  And you were just 6 years old?  That sounds like a terrible coach to me!  Yeah, I still live with my mom and dad.  That makes sense with your schedule; thanks for explaining!  And you’re right, we go back in August.  I have an older brother named Chris.  He’s 22 and still lives at home.  I can’t wait to move out, but it’s probably not going to happen unless I move away for school next year.  Maybe I’ll apply to Jeromeville now that I know someone there :-) and you’re pretty close to my grandparents too.  I don’t have a boyfriend… there’s a guy I’m kind of seeing, but it’s not really serious.  What about you?  Do you have someone special?  And if your family isn’t in Jeromeville, do you have roommates?  Congratulations on your graduation!  Is your family coming?  How was the movie?  I don’t know if I’m going to see it.  I don’t really watch the show.  But I’m glad you like it!  It sounds like fun, watching it with a bunch of friends!

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

That would be so much fun if we both ended up in Jeromeville!  Definitely keep me posted!  Will you be visiting your grandparents in East Bayside any time soon?

Graduation was nice… thank you!  Someone warned me that it would be boring, and it kind of was, but it was good getting to be there with my family.  Afterward, there was a catered lunch thing just for the math department, where they presented me with my award.  It’s still a little weird to think that I’m a college graduate now!  The movie was good too.  It connected to the story of the show, but if you haven’t seen the show, you can still kind of follow what’s going on.  You should see it!

I’ll keep you posted too, because I don’t know for sure if I’ll still be in Jeromeville by then.  It depends on where I can get a job after I finish teacher training next year.  Ideally, though, I would like to stay in Jeromeville and work here or somewhere close enough to commute.  I already know people here, and I love my church.  I don’t know if I actually want to teach at Jeromeville High, though.  I’ve heard that a lot of parents at Jeromeville schools can be kind of overbearing.  That makes sense, with so many people around here in academia.  I know I would be intimidated if I had to call one of my old professors and say that his/her kid is failing math.

I have roommates.  Four of us rent a 3-bedroom house; it’s actually half of a duplex.  Last year I shared the big bedroom and attached bathroom with my friend Sean.  The other two roommates moved out, though, so Sean is moving into his own room.  Jed will be moving into Sean’s spot, and Brody will be moving into the other room.  All three guys I know from Jeromeville Christian Fellowship; Sean also went to the church I used to go to, and Jed and Brody go to the church I go to now.  I don’t love sharing a bedroom, but the rent is cheap.

I don’t have a girlfriend.  It seems like pretty much all of the girls I’ve liked don’t feel the same way about me.  Are you into this guy you’re kind of seeing?  What exactly do you mean when you say it isn’t serious… do you want it to be?  He’s lucky, you seem really nice :)

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Mon, 22 Jun 1998 21:18 -0500
Subject: Re: hi!

Award?  What did you get an award for?  Congratulations!  I’m proud of you!  We might be going to Grandma and Grandpa’s for Christmas.  It would be fun if we could work it out to meet up sometime!  Your house sounds like fun!  I bet you guys have big parties there and stuff.  I never thought about that, what you said about being a teacher in Jeromeville and teaching your professors’ kids… that would be kind of awkward.  The guy I’m seeing, Jason, it’s kind of complicated.  He hasn’t asked me to be exclusive or anything.  But we go out sometimes, and he has his own place so I go over there a lot.  And we recently started sleeping together too, and I stayed the night at his place for the first time last weekend and it was so good!  But I haven’t told very many people because Jason is my brother’s best friend.  My brother has always been protective of me when it comes to my past boyfriends, and he would freak out if he knew his best friend was sleeping with me.  I’m not sure what to do… you’re smart, do you have any advice for me?

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

Wow… that’s quite a story.  I’m not sure how you would tell your brother and your parents about something like that.  I’ve never been through anything like that.  And how were you able to stay the night if you live with your parents and your brother?  Did you sneak out?  Just think this through and don’t do anything you’ll regret.

The award was for having the highest grades in math classes among this year’s math graduates.  I had straight As in all my math classes.  Thank you!

I just got back last night from the Mystery Trip with the kids from church.  Their parents dropped them off Monday morning and picked them up late Tuesday night, and we didn’t tell anyone where we were going.  It was a lot of fun!  First we went to Mt. Lorenzo, to the beach and some of the rides, then we stayed the night in sleeping bags in a church fellowship hall where we know one of the pastors.  On the second day, we did some touristy shopping in Bay City, and went to see the W’s and Five Iron Frenzy.  Do you know them?  I’m tired, I need a nap, I’ll talk to you soon. :)

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 22:11 -0500
Subject: Re: hi!

I stay the night with my best friend Jessica sometimes.  We’ve had sleepovers since we were in fifth grade.  So whenever I want to sleep over with a guy, I just tell my parents I’m staying with Jessica, and whenever she wants to sleep over with a guy, she tells her mom she’s with me.  It’s the perfect system!  We’ve been doing this since high school, and we actually do stay with each other often enough that our parents never check. ;-) I really like Jason, I want to keep seeing him, maybe even be his girlfriend, but I know my brother wouldn’t like it.  It’s not really his decision to make, though.  I’m a big girl, and I can make my own decisions!  You’re smart, getting all A’s in your math classes!  I’m impressed!  Your Mystery Trip sounds fun!  I remember going to Mt. Lorenzo Beach once as a kid.  It’s been a long time, but it sounds like fun!  I remember this really cool old carousel; did you ride that?  Hope you got some good rest!

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

I know that carousel, but I didn’t ride it this time.  I got a quick nap yesterday afternoon.  I’m not doing anything today until Bible study tonight, so I might go for a bike ride.  It’s kind of hot, though, so I should do that soon before it gets any hotter.  I’m going to a wedding on Saturday.  Scott and Amelia, I’ve been friends with them for a few years, they’re a year older than me but we all graduated the same year because they took five years to finish.  And I won’t see them much after the wedding, because they’re moving to New York later this summer.  Amelia is starting medical school there in the fall.  This is the first time I’ve been to a wedding as an adult.  I don’t really know what to expect.  What are you doing this weekend?

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Thu, 02 Jul 1998 19:44 -0500
Subject: Re: hi!

Sorry it took so long to write back!  I’ve had a really rough week.  Jason met someone else and wants to be exclusive with her.  I’m heartbroken.  It’s not really cheating because we were never official, but I really thought we had a connection.  I’ve skipped class a few times and one day I stayed in bed all day.  I’m really a mess, I hope I don’t sound too pathetic right now… I just thought about you the other day and didn’t want you to think I’d forgotten about you!  How was the wedding?  Jessica is going to drag me to a party tomorrow, I hope it’s fun, I need to get out… what are you doing this weekend?

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

Wow, that’s tough… I’m sorry things didn’t work out with Jason.  Kind of messed up on his part, if you ask me.

The wedding was good!  Very nice.  It was at our church with the college pastor speaking.  They had a reception afterward with a lot of dancing.  Scott and Amelia do swing dancing, that’s gotten really popular here lately.  Is it popular where you are too?  Some friends who were also at the wedding talked me into going swing dancing with them the night after the wedding, and I actually enjoyed it.  I didn’t think dancing would ever be a hobby for me, but I’ll probably keep going back, especially if I have friends there.  Have fun at the party!  I’ll talk to you soon!

gjd

From: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Sun, 12 Jul 1998 21:03  -0500 
Subject: Re: hi!

I’m the worst friend ever, I’ve gotten so bad at writing back!  Sorry!  Well, things have happened since I talked to you… The party last weekend, there was this guy there I didn’t know, and we both had a little too much to drink, and we hooked up in an empty bedroom, I don’t remember exactly what happened that night but we hung out a lot this week and I slept over at his place last night… he’s amazing!  I really feel good about this guy!  What about you?  Do you have a girlfriend yet?  What did you do this weekend?

~Casey

To: “Casey Gauthier” <c.gauthier02@txncc.edu>
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: Re: hi!

That happened really fast… no one for me yet.  I went swing dancing again on Sunday.  It’s been fun.  I kind of met someone there, a friend of a friend who recognized me, we danced a few times and talked some, but I don’t know if I’m interested in her like that.  Nothing really going on the rest of the week.  Just the usual stuff, youth group and Bible study.  What about you?

(To be continued…)

Readers: Tell me about a friend that you met through a random encounter on the Internet. Are you still friends with this person?

If you like what you read, don’t forget to like this post and follow this blog. Also follow Don’t Let The Days Go By on Facebook and Instagram.

(February 2024. Year 4 recap.)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 4 Comments

If this is your first time here on Don’t Let The Days Go By, welcome. DLTDGB is a continuing story set in 1998 (currently), about a university student making his way in life. I am currently on hiatus from writing; the story will continue eventually at some unspecified time. This break is taking a lot longer than I expected; real life in 2024 is kind of overwhelming right now.  Today’s post is a recap of the highlights of year 4.

(Also, in case you need it, click here for the recaps of year 1, year 2, and year 3.)

If you are new to DLTDGB and want the complete story, start by clicking here for Episode 1, and then click Next at the end of each episode.

I was not in Jeromeville or at my parents’ house for most of the summer of 1997.  I was hundreds of miles away, doing a math research internship in Oregon.  I applied to this program on the suggestion of Dr. Thomas, one of my favorite professors.

June 22, 1997. My arrival in Oregon. (#135)

I met the other students in the program, found a church, and borrowed a bicycle so I could get around.  I did not have a lot in common with the other students in the program, other than mathematics itself, but I did my share of social activities with them.

June 28 – July 4, 1997. Outings with my new classmates. (#137)

I got to see my great-aunt and uncle a few times that summer; they lived not too far from me in Oregon.  My parents came to see me and other Oregon relatives one weekend.  I missed home terribly, but I made the most of my time in Oregon.  The most life-changing thing that happened during that summer was the realization that I did not want to do mathematics research as a career.

August 12-15, 1997. My final week in Oregon. (#142)

After a couple weeks at my parents’ house, I returned to Jeromeville and moved into a house with Josh McGraw, Sean Richards, and Sam Hoffman.  Josh had been my roommate the previous year as well.  I went to two retreats back-to-back just before school started, one for Jeromeville Christian Fellowship and one for the youth leaders at Jeromeville Covenant Church.

September 15-19, 1997. Seeing my friends again at Outreach Camp. (#145)

Late September, 1997. The retreat with the youth group leaders and a step outside my comfort zone. (#146)

I did chorus again that fall, and we performed at a ceremony for the renaming of a building on campus.  My future plans also solidified at the start of that school year.  With math research off the table, I put all my efforts into becoming a teacher, and I figured out that I would be able to graduate on time in June.  I made a silly movie, based on my Dog Crap & Vince stories, with the kids from the youth group at church.

Late October-early November, 1997. I made a movie. (#150)

I did a lot of things with the youth group at J-Cov that year.  Some of the leaders pulled a memorable prank on the kids, toilet-papering seventeen kids’ houses on the same night.  We also took a nine-hour road trip to San Diego for the National Youth Workers’ Convention.  I saw a lot of Christian bands play there.  Although most of my experiences at J-Cov over the years were positive, I saw a darker side when someone I knew there began harassing and almost stalking me.  He eventually had his church membership revoked; I was not the only one whom he had done this to.

November 30 – December 8, 1997. But he won’t admit he has a problem. (#155)

I had my eye on a few girls that year.  Carrie Valentine was two years behind me; I knew her from JCF.  She was nice, and she was easy to talk to.  I finally got brave and spoke up, and things did not turn out as I had hoped.

December 9-12, 1997.  Not everything follows consistent rules the way math does. (#156)

Over winter break, I made another movie with my brother and his friends, and I took a trip to my old roommate Brian Burr’s New Year party, where I got to see some of our older friends who had graduated.  When I returned to school for the new quarter, I interned in a high school classroom, to get more experience to prepare for my future career as a teacher.  I had recently discovered how much I loved In-N-Out Burger, and a location opened in Jeromeville that quarter.  I was there on the day it opened.

January 16, 1998.  A fresh cheeseburger, and a fresh take on relationships. (#160)

That winter, I went to Winter Camp with the youth group kids.  I started spending my Sunday nights at the De Anza house, where the guys hosted weekly watch parties for The X-Files.  That was already one of my favorite shows, and now I got to enjoy it with a large group of friends.

February 8, 1998. A new weekly tradition. (#162)

Sadie Rowland was another girl I was interested in at the time.  She was, like Carrie, two years younger than me, and she went to JCF.  She was the kind of girl whom I could sit there and talk to for hours, and it would feel like no time had passed at all.  She was preparing to leave the area for six months to do an internship, and we made plans to see a certain movie that was popular at the time.  The plans fell through, I never saw the movie, and Sadie for the most part disappeared out of my life.

March 5, 1998. My heart will not go on. (#165)

The University of Jeromeville men’s basketball team won the national championship for their level, one of the greatest accomplishments in Jeromeville Colts history.  Spring quarter started with an unexpected surprise: Carrie Valentine was in two of my classes, despite being in a major very different from mine.  I was able to let go of any lingering awkwardness, and we got to be friends again.  Besides, a new girl had caught my eye: Sasha Travis from church, even though she was only seventeen.

Early April, 1998. Trash. (#168)

With Josh and Sam planning to move out over the summer, I managed to find two new roommates to move in with Sean and me for the following year: Brody, another youth leader from church, and Jed, a freshman from JCF who would be moving out of the dorm at the end of the year.  JCF had a spring retreat that year.  Taylor, Pete, and Noah, who had been more involved with church than JCF the last few years, all went on the retreat, knowing it would be their last JCF retreat.

April 24-26, 1998. My lasting friendships had been captured in that group photo. (#171)

I did a lot of creative writing that year, and I took a Fiction Writing class that quarter.  We had a project to write a story and share a copy with everyone in the class.  I wrote a story about an awkward guy and a girl he liked, inspired by Sasha.  It was the first time I had ever shared my writing with an audience of people who did not know me well, and the experience was humbling.

May 6, 1998. “August Fog”: a short story to share with the class. (#173)

May 12, 1998. What I learned the most from sharing my story was not about writing. (#174)

A lot of other things happened that year.  My parents came to the Spring Picnic, and I decided that I enjoyed it better without them.  Noah and Taylor taught me to play Catan.  I was inducted as a member of Phi Beta Kappa.  I shared my testimony at JCF’s senior night, wearing a shirt with Brent Wang’s face on it.  I came in second at the Man of Steel competition, my best finish ever.  And I made a board game based on Dog Crap and Vince.  But the most important thing that happened was graduation.  I was finished with my Bachelor of Science degree, and ready to start the teacher training program next year.

June 20, 1998. Life was beginning to take shape. (#180)

Here is the complete year 4 playlist:

Let me know how you’ve been the last few months!

March 5, 1998.  My heart will not go on. (#165)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 10 Comments

Disclaimer: I had this episode planned and partially written before the news broke about the missing tourists trying to explore the wreck of the Titanic. I am not trying to capitalize on a tragedy.

As finals approached for the 1998 winter quarter, Titanic was the biggest movie in the world.  The movie, a fictional love story set against the backdrop of the historical 1912 sinking of the British ship Titanic, had been the highest-grossing film of 1997 despite having been released just two weeks before the end of the year.  It won many major awards, and it was still the number one movie in theaters now, almost three months after its release.  As is often the case with major successful movies like that, the soundtrack spawned a hit pop song, “My Heart Will Go On” by Céline Dion.  Like the movie, the song went on to become one of the most commercially successful songs of all time.

I had never seen the movie.  Nor had I ever heard the song; I did not listen to that crap.

I never thought of myself as much of a moviegoer.  Going to movies was something people did with friends, and I had never had much of a social life until recently.  Something did not feel right about going to a movie by myself, so if I wanted to see a movie, and plans never came up to see it, I just did not watch it.  

However, although love stories were not my preferred movie genre, I was intrigued by Titanic.  I wanted to see it for the special effects; the filmmakers built and sank an actual replica of the Titanic.  That was impressive in its own right.  But I had no plans to do so.

One Thursday, I had a bit of free time on campus, so I walked into the Memorial Union building, looking for a place to sit and do math homework for the next two hours.  I walked through the doors of the east entrance, near the bookstore, and began heading toward the Coffee House at the other end of the building, where I planned to look for a place to sit.  But before I even got to the Coffee House, I found something more interesting to me, something about five foot five with straight brown hair halfway down her back and smiling blue eyes.

“Hey, Sadie,” I said, waving.

“Greg!” Sadie replied.  “What’s up?”

“Just looking for a place to sit and hang out until my next class.”

“Me too!  Come on!”  Sadie walked in the same direction I was about to go, and I followed her.  It was a relatively nice Fake Spring day outside, sunny and pleasant, typical of the week or two of nice weather that Jeromeville always got around this time of year before it turned cold and dreary again.  The indoor tables were not excessively crowded, as they would be on a rainy day.  “How about here?” Sadie said, gesturing to a table near the far end of the Coffee House.

“Looks good,” I said.  Sadie sat facing south, toward the window looking out at the Quad, and I sat across from her.  “How are you?”

“I had a midterm this morning.  It was kind of hard.  I don’t think I did very well.”

“What class?”

“History.  I didn’t study as much as I could have.  I’m pretty good at BS’ing essay questions, though, so I might have done okay.”

“Nice,” I replied.  “I’m not good at BS’ing.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.  Like, if I have a paper to write, I have to start planning it at least a week or two in advance.  I need time to go to the library and do research, and usually half of what I’m looking for is already checked out.  And I need to think things through.”

“Wow.”

“And with essay questions on tests, I have to do a lot of studying in advance, to the point that I’m ready for whatever they might ask.  Believe me, I wish I could BS a paper like you can.”

“You probably have a better GPA than those of us who BS papers, though.”

“That’s true.  And, as a math major, I don’t have to write papers as often.”

“Yeah.  That too.  When do you write papers, anyway?”

“Classes for general ed requirements.  And the English classes that everyone has to take,” I explained, “although I took AP English in high school, so I only had to take Advanced Comp.  And this quarter I have Ed Psych, as a prerequisite for the teaching program next year.”

“Yeah, I guess you would still have to write papers.”

“Next quarter I’m taking Fiction Writing.  For the teaching program, I need to have a certain number of units in English, no matter what subject I’ll be teaching, and I’m one class short.  It can be anything, and Fiction Writing looks like the most fun option.”

“That does sound fun!  Have you written fiction before?”

“I write stories for fun sometimes.”

“That’s really cool!” Sadie exclaimed.

“Would you ever want to read some of my stories?”

“Sure!  I mean, I don’t know how much time I’ll have now with finals coming up, but maybe once that’s out of the way.”

“I’ll send you something sometime after finals, then.”

“Thanks!”

“Anyway, I was saying, Ed Psych is the only final I have to write for this year.  I have two math classes with regular math finals, and no final for my internship at Jeromeville High.”

“How’s that going, by the way?” Sadie asked

“It’s good, but it’s been eye-opening,” I explained.  “When I did this last year, it was with a class of pretty much all college-bound kids.  These kids aren’t all like that.  A lot of them aren’t motivated to work as hard, and they don’t pay attention in class.”

“That makes sense.  But you’ll probably get a lot of that when you’re an actual teacher someday.”

“Yeah.  Speaking of internships, you’re leaving for Washington, D.C., soon, right?”

“Yes!  I leave the week after spring break.  I’m so excited!”

“And what will you be doing exactly?  Something in the House of Representatives, was it?”

“Yeah!  Working for the Congressman who represents our district back home.  My parents have helped out on his campaign before.  He’s great.”

“Good!” I said.  I knew enough about Sadie’s political leanings to know that if she liked this guy, he must be good, and I probably would agree with the way he voted most of the time.

“Mostly just office work,” Sadie explained, “but I’ll get to learn a lot about how the process works.”

“That’s really cool.  I’m excited for you.”

“Thanks!”

“Keep in touch after you leave.”

“Yeah!  I will!”  Sadie replied.

We continued talking as time passed, about everything from classes to future plans to high school friends back home, of which Sadie still had many.  “I don’t hear from any of my high school friends anymore,” I said.  “I guess I wasn’t super close to them to begin with.  I didn’t really do anything with friends until I was a senior, old enough to drive.  Plumdale is spread out, and I lived kind of far from everyone.”

“That makes sense.  I lived near a lot of my friends from high school.  They all went off to school after we graduated, but we still try to get together when we’re home on break.”

“That’s good.  I wish I had that.  I made some new friends senior year too, and then all of a sudden they were gone after we all moved away.”

“That’s too bad, but it happens,” Sadie said.

“One of those new friends I made senior year, I saw her here once, walking across the MU.  It was the weirdest thing.  She was younger, she was still a senior in high school at the time, but her boyfriend and her brother both went to Jeromeville, and Plumdale High had a day off, so she and her friend came up to visit.”

“And you just bumped into each other?  That’s weird.”

“That was the last time I ever heard from her,” I said, nostalgically and wistfully.  I had not thought about Annie Gambrell for a long time, until now.  “But, I don’t know, maybe it’s for the best.”  I lowered my voice, leaned in a little closer to Sadie, and explained, barely above a whisper, “I had a big crush on her, and she had a boyfriend.”

“Oh yeah,” Sadie replied with a slight chuckle.  “That’s rough.”

“Story of my life.”

“Aww.”  Sadie yawned, and continued, “Sorry!  I’m tired.  I didn’t sleep well last night.”

“I hate that.”

“My roommate and her boyfriend got home late from the movie theater last night.  They went to see Titanic, because I guess he had never seen it.  And then they came home and woke me up, and they stayed up in the living room talking.”

“That’s annoying,” I said.  “I’ve never seen Titanic either.  I want to.”

“It was so good!  I saw it once when I was home for Christmas.  I want to see it again.”

Every once in a while, an opportunity would drop into my lap perfectly.  And some of those times I would actually get brave and take the opportunity.  “Do you want to see it with me sometime?” I asked.  “Will you have time before you leave for D.C.?”

“Yeah!” Sadie exclaimed.  “I have a lot to do before I leave, and finals are coming up, but I should be able to work something out.  I’ll figure out my schedule and get back to you.”

“Perfect!” I said.

“Oh crap,” Sadie said, looking at her watch.  “I need to get going.  I have class.”

“What time is it?” I wondered aloud, while looking at my watch.  Almost two hours had passed since Sadie and I had sat down in the Memorial Union.  “Wow.  It doesn’t feel like it’s this late.”

“I know!”

“It was really good hanging out,” I said.  “Hope your class goes well.  And keep me posted about the movie.”

“Yeah!  I will!  It was good talking to you.”

“You too!”

As I watched Sadie walk away, I thought about how this was not the first time this had happened to us, getting lost in conversation and losing track of the time.  Sadie was one of those rare people whom I could talk to for hours, all while feeling that no time had passed at all.


By the middle of the following week, I still had not heard back from Sadie about going to see Titanic.  I wrote her an email one night during a study break:

To: srrowland@jeromeville.edu
From: gjdennison@jeromeville.edu
Subject: movie

Hey!  How is studying going?  Are you ready for finals?  I think mine will be ok.  Ed Psych is the one I’m most worried about, mostly just because it’s not math, and I’m going to have to write an essay, and you know I don’t BS essays very well. :)

What’s your schedule like?  Are we still going to see Titanic?  How is all of the preparation for your internship going?  Good luck with finals, and I’ll see you soon!

gjd

The next day, I checked my email frequently during study breaks for the whole time I was home.  I got excited when I saw that I had a message from Sadie, but I became considerably less excited as I read the message:

From: “Sadie Rowland” <srrowland@jeromeville.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Wed, 11 Mar 1998 13:46 -0800
Subject: Re: movie

Hi Greg!  Unfortunately, I don’t think I can.  I just have too much to do this week, getting ready for finals and packing for DC.  Sorry!  I hope you have a great finals week!  Good luck!

I wrote back later, just making small talk about life and finals and stuff, and asking Sadie about her upcoming internship back east.  Finals came and went, I went home for spring break without my computer or access to email, and I returned to Jeromeville a few days before classes started.  A couple days into spring quarter, almost three weeks after my last message, Sadie finally wrote back. 

From: “Sadie Rowland” <srrowland@jeromeville.edu>
To: “Gregory Dennison” <gjdennison@jeromeville.edu>
Date: Tue, 31 Mar 1998 19:34 -0500
Subject: Re: movie

Hey!  Sorry it took me so long to write back!  I’ve had so much going on.  The trip here went well, and I’ve gotten situated here.  Today was my second actual day of work for the internship.  It’s been great so far!  I love it!

I had to pack in a lot during my spring break, trying to get everything ready and seeing all my friends and family here before I left.  It was good, but mostly just hanging out and catching up with people.  The weekend before I left, I went to the beach with a bunch of my friends, and we had a great time.  Oh yeah, this one guy I dated off and on for part of high school, he and I reconnected while we were here, and we got back together! We’re doing long distance now, obviously, but it works out perfectly because he’s busy with school, and he’s going to come stay with me in DC for three weeks in the summer because he’s never seen the East Coast.  And he’s moving to Jeromeville in the fall for grad school, so then we’ll be together!

How was your spring break?  Did you do anything exciting?
-Sadie

Of course it had to end this way.  It always ended like that, I liked someone and she met someone else.  But at least Sadie was still a good friend, and she had access to email in Washington, so we could stay in touch while she was doing her internship with the House of Representatives.

Or so I thought.

I replied to Sadie’s message and told her about my spring break, but Sadie never wrote another email to me that entire spring or summer.  When school started again in the fall, Sadie was no longer going to Jeromeville Christian Fellowship, and I never saw her hanging out in the Memorial Union anymore.  I did see her once, in November, while I was walking across campus on the way to class.  She was walking in the opposite direction, with a guy who appeared to be the boyfriend she had told me about in March.  They looked like she had somewhere to be.  I waved, and she said, “Hey,” and kept on walking.

And that was the last time I ever saw her or spoke to her.

I never saw Titanic, with Sadie or with anyone else.  It was for many years the highest-grossing film of all time, yet I have never seen it.  For a while, the thought of seeing Titanic brought back sad memories of not being friends with Sadie anymore.  Then, several months after that happened, I heard my friend Jed Wallace give his opinion about how Titanic was a terrible movie, and everything he said made sense to me.  Jed’s thoughts, combined with stories I heard over the course of that year about creepy old ladies going to see Titanic ten times on the big screen because they thought 23-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio was so hot, turned me against the idea of seeing the movie.  By the end of 1998, never having seen Titanic had become a badge of honor for me.

I also never did get around to sending Sadie any of the stories I had written.  In light of  the emotional shock of being turned down from seeing the movie and learning about Sadie’s new boyfriend, I just never brought that up again.

I have learned over the years that sometimes friends naturally grow apart, and that it does not necessarily represent failure on my part.  But I still find it discouraging.  I remembered what it was like to not have friends, when I was younger, so every friendship felt exceptionally valuable to me.  It especially hurt to grow apart from someone like Sadie, since I always felt like we clicked so well.  Of course, she came back to Jeromeville with a boyfriend, and he may have had a problem with her having a lot of guy friends.  It is natural that Sadie’s friendships with guys would change when a boyfriend came along.  But I still did not like it.  I wanted my close friends to stay close, and while I thought Sadie was a great girl, I had no intention of trying to steal her away from her boyfriend.  I could do nothing about it when people grew apart from me like this, except to do everything in my power to make sure I did not grow apart from the people I cared about when my own circumstances changed.

Readers: Have you ever abruptly lost touch with someone you thought was a close friend? I’m sorry… tell me about it in the comments, if it’s not too painful to talk about.

If you like what you read, don’t forget to like this post and follow this blog. Also follow Don’t Let The Days Go By on Facebook and Instagram.

January 23, 1998.  An almost perfect Friday. (#161)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 10 Comments

In the winter of 1998, I began every school day with my internship in Mr. Gibson’s class at Jeromeville High School.  I was starting to feel like I was learning more about what not to do when I was a teacher someday.  Jeromeville was a university town, the locals placed a high value on education, and parents often bought their students fancy, expensive graphing calculators for math class.  The predominant model at the time was the Texas Instruments TI-82.  In those days, the Internet was emerging as a mainstream technology, and the kids all knew either how to download games onto their graphing calculators or copy games from their friends’ calculators.  Mr. Gibson’s teaching style was lecture-based and kind of dry, and half the class was tuned out, playing games on their calculators.  That just made me sad.  I thought about telling this to Mr. Gibson, but as a 21-year-old undergraduate intern, I did not feel right questioning a veteran teacher on his teaching style.

 As I was leaving, I passed by Jeromeville High students on their way from first to second period.  I saw a familiar slim brown-haired girl with glasses approaching; she was a senior named Sasha Travis, and she and her family went to my church.  I usually saw her in passing as I was leaving the high school after Mr. Gibson’s class, and I knew her well enough to wave and say hi.

“Hey, Greg!” Sasha exclaimed.  “How are you?”

“Pretty good.  Glad it’s Friday.”

“Me too!  Have a good weekend!”

“Thanks!  You too!”

I went straight to the university campus after I left Jeromeville High, as I always did.  I parked my bike near the Memorial Union and walked inside.  With almost an hour before my next class, I had time for one of my favorite daily rituals: reading the school newspaper, the Daily Colt.  At some point in my childhood, I started reading the local newspaper regularly every day, and I have done that ever since.  Jeromeville has a local newspaper, but my roommates subscribed to the nearby big-city newspaper, the Capital City Record, before I had any input into the issue, so these days I read the Record every morning before I leave the house.  That was how I got most of my news on the major issues of the day.  Then at some point during a break between classes, I would read the Daily Colt to get campus and local Jeromeville news.

I did not always read every story; I skimmed or outright ignored the ones that were less interesting.  I saw a story buried on page five about some plant pathology professor who had won some award, which I was about to skip until I noticed the by-line under the headline: “BY SADIE ROWLAND, COLT CAMPUS WRITER.”  Sadie was my friend, so I always read her articles.  I might see her tonight at Jeromeville Christian Fellowship, and if I told her I read her article, maybe she would like that.  It would give me something to say to her, at least.

After I read Sadie’s article, I found Joseph Tomlinson‘s weekly column. The Daily Colt was published Monday through Friday, and each of the five days of the week featured a different student columnist.  Typically two of them wrote about political issues, one from a liberal perspective and one from a conservative perspective, and the other three just wrote about their lives as students at the University of Jeromeville.  Joseph Tomlinson was in his second year of being the conservative columnist, and his column this week was on Jeromeville’s obsession with “small-town feel.”

The Jeromeville City Council had a distinct anti-corporate bias in those days, which is still the case today.  A running joke among Jeromevillians was that one cannot buy underwear in Jeromeville.  The local leaders believed that large chain department stores did not belong in a small town like Jeromeville.  While I saw the value in supporting small, locally owned businesses, I was hesitant to support government interference in the free market.  Also, this position was built on false pretenses to begin with, because whatever it was once, Jeromeville was not a small town anymore.  Sixty thousand people lived in the city limits, and another eight thousand lived on campus just outside the city limits.  And with no clothing stores in Jeromeville, people had to drive eight miles north to Woodville or twenty miles east to Capital City to shop, putting more pollution in the air.  The chain stores all went to Woodville instead, even though Woodville had only three-fourths the population of Jeromeville.

Recently, the corporate chains won a rare victory in Jeromeville with the opening of Borders Books.  This upset many people, but a bookstore was classy enough that it did not anger Jeromevillians as much as something like Walmart would have.  Joseph Tomlinson pointed out in his column that one of the City Council members owned a bookstore, so he should have recused himself from votes related to Borders because of a conflict of interest.  I agreed.  “Vote no on Small Town Feel,” Tomlinson concluded.  “Small Town Feel violates the American concept of freedom.”  I always do, Mr. Tomlinson.  I always do.


On Friday nights, I attended the large group meetings of Jeromeville Christian Fellowship, back on campus.  When I arrived that night, I found an empty seat and sat down.  A guy with bushy blond hair wearing a collared shirt, slacks, and a flat gray driver cap sat next to me a few minutes later.  I had seen this guy around JCF before; he always stood out to me because he was more well-dressed than the typical university student, and because he wore cool hats.  “Hey,” I said as he sat down.  His name tag said “Jed.”

“Hi,” Jed replied.  “What’s up?”

“Not much.  Just glad it’s the weekend.”

“I know!  What was your name again?”

“Greg,” I said.  Then I pointed to his name tag and asked, “Jed?  I know I’ve seen you around before.”

“Yeah.  Jed.  It’s nice to meet you.” Jed shook my hand.  “What year are you?”

“I’m a senior.  You?”

“Freshman.”

“They’re starting, so we should probably be quiet,” I said in a loud whisper as I heard the worship team start playing. “But It was nice to meet you.”

“You too!” Jed replied.

As I stood and sang along to the music, I turned around and saw that, while I had been talking to Jed, Sadie Rowland had arrived, sitting in the row behind me.  I smiled and waved, and she waved back.

An hour and a half later, after the talk and more worship music, I still had no plans for afterward.  I was about to ask Jed if he was doing anything, but he spoke first.  “I need to get going,” he said.  “I’ll see you next week?”

“Sure,” I replied.  “Have a good weekend!”

I turned around, hoping that Sadie was still sitting behind me; she was.  “Hey,” I said.

“Hi, Greg!  How are you?” Sadie asked.

“Good.  Just been busy with school.  How are you?”

“Same.  I had a paper due today.  I finished it at the last minute.”

“You finished it.  That’s what’s important.”

“Right?”

“Hey.  I saw your article in the Daily Colt today, about that professor who won the award.  It was good.”

“Thanks!” Sadie replied.  “It was interesting researching and writing that story, but I’m hoping to get moved to local politics next year.  That’s really what I want to write.”

“I know.  They need a conservative voice on the Colt, even though they probably don’t want one.”

“Yeah, really.”

“I guess they have Joseph Tomlinson, but he’s just a columnist, not a reporter.”

“Joseph Tomlinson is great!”

“Yes!” I agreed.  “He’s hilarious, and insightful too.  I loved his column today on Small Town Feel.  Jeromeville can be pretty ridiculous.”

“I know!  You’ve been here two years longer than I have, so I’m sure you’ve seen more of the Jeromeville ridiculousness.”

“Definitely.  Like the ‘historic’ muddy alleys where mosquitoes breed, but they won’t pave them because of the neighborhood’s historic character.”

“Wow,” Sadie said, rolling her eyes.

“And you know about the frog tunnel, right?”

“Yeah.  That’s so weird.”

“I know.  One City Councilmember was quoted as saying she wanted to build connections to the frog community.”

“Like the frogs have any idea what’s going on,” Sadie added.  “But, yeah, the media is so biased.  The newspaper back home keeps calling our house trying to get us to subscribe, and my dad is like, ‘Stop calling me.  I don’t want to read your Commie trash.’”

I laughed.  “That’s a good one.  I should try something like that next time someone calls me trying to sell me something.”

“That would be funny.”

“Yeah.  So how was your week?  What else did you do?”

“We had Bible study yesterday.”

“Nice,” I said.  “My Bible study is huge.  We do a few worship songs together, then we split into three groups to do the actual study part.  We come back together for prayer requests at the end.”

“Which one is that?  Who are the leaders?”

“Joe Fox and Lydia Tyler.”

“How big is huge?”

“We average probably between twenty and twenty-five each week.”

“Twenty-five!  That’s too big for a study group like this.  Why is it so big?”

“It’s exactly what I said was going to happen. JCF has moved so much toward groups for specific populations.  You’re in a Kairos group, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Those are handpicked by their leaders, and people like me never get included. And there’s the group for transfer students, and the group for student athletes, and the two groups just for women.  All of us who don’t fit those categories only had one group left to choose from, so that group ended up huge.”

“I don’t think the Kairos ministry is supposed to be about excluding people, but I get what you’re saying,” Sadie observed.

“I’m concerned with the direction JCF is going.  There’s also a group specifically for Filipinos, and I’ve heard someone say that next year they want to make more groups specifically for people from certain cultural backgrounds.  How is that not racist?  Aren’t we supposed to treat each other equally and not be segregated by race?”

“That’s messed up.”

“I know.  Paul said in Galatians that there is no Jew nor Greek, for all are one in Christ Jesus.”

“Exactly!  Maybe you should tell Dave or Janet or one of the leaders your concerns.”

“I have.  Didn’t do any good.”

“That’s too bad.  What are you guys studying?”

I told Sadie that we were going through Romans, and I tried to remember specifically what insights I had that I could share with her.  She told me about her Kairos group and everything that they had learned.  Her group seemed to have the same kind of studies as other groups, but with a specific focus toward preparing student leaders, which was the stated mission of the Kairos ministry.

“You have any exciting plans coming up?” Sadie asked me a bit later.

“Not this weekend.  But in a few weeks, I’m taking the basic skills test I need to get into the teacher training program.  And then I’m going straight from there to meet up with the kids from church at Winter Camp.  I’ll be joining them a day late.”

“Winter Camp sounds fun!  What is this test?”

“It’s required for anyone wanting to be a teacher, or a substitute, or anything like that.  It looks like it’ll be pretty easy.  It’s just meant to show that you have the equivalent of a ninth grade education.”

“Really?  Only ninth grade?”

“Yes.  And a lot of people are complaining that teachers shouldn’t have to take the test.  They say it excludes people who would otherwise be good teachers.”

“How?  How can you be a good teacher without a ninth grade education?”

“I know!  They say it’s racially biased.”

“Of course.  Everything is racially biased these days.”

“If I had kids,” I said, “I wouldn’t care what color skin their teacher had, but I certainly would insist on a teacher who could do ninth grade reading and math.  If you’re a teacher, you need to understand more than just the material you’re teaching.”

“And that’s why you’re gonna be a great teacher.”

“Aww,” I smiled.  “Thank you.”

“We definitely need good teachers.  A lot of my teachers in high school were ready to retire and just there for the paycheck.  And, of course, I had a history teacher who was really liberal.  He and I used to get into arguments all the time.”

“That would have been fun to watch.  I wish I had been in your class to see that.”

Sadie laughed.  “I could have used your support.  I did have one other friend who used to jump into those arguments and take my side.”

“That’s good.  I had a friend kind of like that in history class, but he usually started the argument with our teacher, and I’d join in.  He was kind of annoying, but we had a lot of classes together, and I liked having a conservative friend.”

“Annoying how?”

I told Sadie about Jason Lambert and how he could be kind of loud and argumentative, and also about the time he asked out the girl that I wished I had the guts to ask out.  But I also told her some good things about Jason, like the project we did in Spanish class where I was a bully taking his lunch money.  Jason’s character used a magical growth drink called La Leche de Crecer, at which point we paused the recording and replaced Jason with a six-foot-seven football player, who proceeded to take revenge on my bully character.  Sadie told me about some of her more memorable high school friends, and some of the parties she had gone to with them.  She had a bit more active social life than I did in high school, apparently.

“Hey, did I tell you I’m going to Washington, D.C. for the spring and summer?” Sadie asked after the conversation about high school reached a lull. 

“I don’t think so.  What’s this for?”

“An internship with my Congressman from back home.”

“That’s great!”

“Yeah!  I’ve met him a few times.  My dad volunteered for his campaign.”

“That’ll be good experience for you.  When do you leave?”

“April.  I’ll go home for spring break, then stay there for two weeks, then I’ll be gone until the middle of September.  I’m going on planned leave for spring quarter.”

“That’s exciting!  I’ll miss seeing you around spring quarter.”

“I know!  I’ll miss everyone here.  And I’ll miss Outreach Camp.  I had so much fun there this year.”

“I know.  I have to miss Outreach Camp too, because I will have started student teaching by then.  The school where I’m teaching will start earlier than UJ.”

“Do you know where you’ll be student teaching yet?”

“No, but probably not Jeromeville High.  The professor who runs it says the student population in Jeromeville doesn’t reflect what we’ll see in the average teaching position around here.  Jeromeville families tend to be wealthier and more educated.”

“That makes sense,” Sadie observed.

“Greg, Sadie, time to go, you two,” I heard Tabitha Sasaki’s voice call out from across the room.  I looked up, confused.  The room was empty, except for me and Sadie, and Tabitha, who was carrying the last of the worship band’s equipment toward the door.  I looked at my watch.  Sadie and I had been talking for over an hour, long enough for all of the hundred or so others to go home and the staff and student leaders to put everything away and clean up the room.  And I had not noticed any of this.

“I guess we have to go now,” Sadie said.  “I should get home and go to bed anyway.”

“Did you drive here?  Where’d you park?”

“I’m over in the lot by Marks.”

“I’ll walk you to your car,” I said.  I grabbed my Bible, Sadie grabbed hers, and we walked out into the dark but clear night, with no moon and only a few stars visible beyond the streetlights lighting the path we walked.  “You said you just turned in a paper?  Does that mean this will be a relaxing weekend?”

“Unfortunately, no.  I have a midterm Monday.”

“That sucks.  But good luck.”

“Thanks.”

We had arrived at Sadie’s car by that point.  “It was nice talking to you,” I said.

“You too!  I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah.”

“Good night, Greg.”

“Good night.”

I walked toward my car, but before I unlocked my car, I watched Sadie drive off.  I got in the car and began the trip home a minute later.

If I could live my university years again, knowing what I know now about life as an adult, I would take more chances.  I would not have wasted this opportunity, getting thoroughly lost in conversation with a cute girl, and walking her to her car, only to watch her drive off without attempting to make some kind of future plans.  I did not know exactly what to do; I was always just trying to be a good Christian and be friends first and not rush into dating.  But this did not work for me, because I did not know what to do once I was friends with a girl.  As a student, I was surrounded by others in more or less the same stage of life as me.  I did not come to realize until my thirties that life would never be like that again.  As I write this in my mid-forties, I have grown apart from many of my friends, and I have found it difficult to meet people and  make new friends.  If I had been able to see the future on that winter day in 1998, if I had known the directions that mine and Sadie’s lives would take, I would have done everything imaginable not to let her just drive away that night.  Things might not have worked out between us, but at least I would have known that I tried my best.

Readers: Tell me in the comments about a night you wish could have ended differently.

I updated the Dramatis Personae. Some of the entries were badly out of date. And Sadie didn’t even have an entry; she was just listed, with no last name, under “Others from JCF.” If anyone is looking for hints of what will happen in the rest of Year 4, it is noteworthy that two characters who were just briefly introduced in this episode now have their own entries already…

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March 14, 1997.  The Lord gave you the one he took from me. (#124)

~ Greg Dennison ~ 17 Comments

I had missed class six times so far at the University of Jeromeville.  One time, I stayed home from class because I was really sick.  Four times, my appointment for the automated phone system to register for classes for the next term fell at a time when I had class.  If I was planning on signing up for a high demand class, I wanted to register as soon as possible.

The sixth time I missed class was on the last day of classes before winter quarter finals my junior year.  I went to my classes in the morning, but I left campus early, before the New Testament Writings of John class, and the reason I missed class was the most important reason in the world, at least it was if your roommate was Brian Burr.

We all met at the house where Eddie Baker and John Harvey lived, since their house was the farthest east and closest to Capital City.  The sixteen of us took four cars east on Highway 100, across the river and through downtown Capital City, to the movie theater just past Capital East Mall.

“Why are we going to Cap City to see this movie?” a guy in my car named Clint asked at one point. “Isn’t it showing in Jeromeville too?”

“Bigger theater, easier to get tickets,” I explained.  “That’s what Brian said, at least.”

A few minutes later, the sixteen of us who had carpooled from Jeromeville entered the theater, tickets for the Special Edition of Return of the Jedi in hand.  Lucasfilm, the company behind the Star Wars movies, had recently rereleased the first two movies, with new scenes to match the original vision for the movies, and today, the final movie in the series was being rereleased.  I saw Star Wars with Barefoot James a couple weeks after it had been rereleased, and I saw The Empire Strikes Back last Saturday with Brian and some of the same people I was with today.

Brian had seen all of these movies hundreds of times over his lifetime, and The Empire Strikes Back last week was Brian’s second time seeing the rerelease.  I, on the other hand, had only seen bits and pieces of the first two movies a few times, not enough to remember all the details of the story.  The surprising revelation at the end of The Empire Strikes Back, that Darth Vader was Luke’s father, was common knowledge by 1997, even among those who were not huge Star Wars fans.  But the movie still alluded to secrets that were beyond my knowledge, since I had never seen Return of the Jedi.  On the way home from the theater last week, I asked Brian, “The part where Luke flies away from Dagobah, when Obi-Wan says that Luke is the last hope, and Yoda says, ‘No, there is another’… was that referring to something in Return of the Jedi?”

“Yes!” Brian said.  “And if you don’t know, I’m not telling you.  You’ll find out.  I’m not giving it away.”

I could feel the anticipation building as the movie started, with the backstory scrolling up the screen.  I read about Luke Skywalker trying to rescue Han Solo, whom Jabba the Hutt had frozen in carbonite at the end of the last movie, and the Empire rebuilding the Death Star, which the Rebels had destroyed in the first movie.  After the battle with Jabba the Hutt, in which Princess Leia wore the famous steel bikini which I was not aware of before that day, Luke left the Rebels temporarily to finish training with Yoda.  When Luke arrived, Yoda was dying, presumably of natural causes since he was nine hundred years old.  And after giving Luke some final words about confronting Vader, Yoda said, “There is another Skywalker,” as he died.  I moved up to the edge of my seat, knowing that the answer to the biggest question that the previous movie had left for me was coming.

In the next scene, the ghost of Obi-Wan Kenobi appeared to Luke, and at one point,. Luke asked Obi-Wan about Yoda’s final words.  Obi-Wan explained that Yoda meant Luke’s twin sister; Luke did not know of her existence.  I gasped… it had to be Leia; she was by far the biggest female role in the Star Wars movies.  Luke figured out the same thing a few lines later.

The Rebels blew up the second Death Star, as I suspected they would, with the help of the primitive teddy-bear-like Ewoks.  I always assumed that the Ewoks only existed to be cute and cuddly, and sell Star Wars toys to girls.  Throughout the movie, Luke kept saying that there was still good in his father, and Darth Vader redeemed himself in the end.

“What’d you think?” Brian asked me as soon as we got out of the theater.

“That was so good!” I replied.

“I saw you react when they said Leia was Luke’s sister.  That was a genuine reaction.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“By the way, I’m curious… what was the next thing you thought of after that scene?”

I did not want to be put on the spot.  I did not know what Brian was getting at.  But I did remember something.  “I thought, didn’t Luke and Leia kiss in the last movie?” I said.

“Yes!” Brian exclaimed, laughing.  “That’s what’s so funny about it.”

“Wait,” Clint said.  “Greg?  You’ve never seen this movie before?”

“No.  First time.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.  I didn’t know how it was going to end or anything.  I didn’t know Darth Vader was going to turn good.”

“Weird,” Clint replied.  “That’s kind of mind-blowing.  To me, it’s just one of those things everyone knows.  Grass is green.  The sky is blue.  Darth Vader turns good.”

It must have been nice having a normal childhood, I thought, but I just kept my mouth shut at that.  I knew Clint did not mean to be hurtful, so I did my best not to let his comment get to me.


Had this trip to see Return of the Jedi happened in the evening, I would have gone to bed happy, feeling like this was one of the best days ever.  However, it was a Friday afternoon, so my day was not over.  I had Jeromeville Christian Fellowship that night, normally a source of inspiration and fellowship, but also a source of tension at times, because of the cliques within the group.  I was still on a high from seeing Return of the Jedi, being included in that clique, and I responded with an enthusiastic yes when Eddie and John, who had also both been at Return of the Jedi, invited me to go bowling afterward.

The University of Jeromeville had a bowling alley on campus, the only bowling alley in Jeromeville, underneath the campus bookstore.  The school has a bowling team, and the physical education department offers a bowling class for half a unit, which I took in the fall of sophomore year.  I walked to the bowling alley under a sky lit by a half moon, along with Eddie and John, Kristina Kasparian, Lorraine Mathews, Tabitha Sasaki, Jason Costello, Ramon Quintero, Clint who could not believe that I had never seen Return of the Jedi, and Haley Channing.  It had been three months since Haley told me that my feelings for her were not reciprocated, and I was trying to stay friends, but it felt like we did not talk much anymore.  She was ahead of me as the ten of us walked toward the bowling alley, so all I could see was her back, but I could picture her beautiful blue eyes and sweet smile as she and Kristina talked.

“Ready for finals, Greg?” Eddie asked, snapping me back to reality.

“I think so,” I replied.  “At least as ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Are you going to Spring Breakthrough?”

“Yeah,” I replied.  “Brian said it’s gonna be really good.”

“Good!  I’m glad you’re coming.  Are you doing anything else for Spring Break?  Going to Plumdale?”

“Yeah.  Just hanging out with my family for a while.  What about you?”

“Same.  I’m going to speak at my church back home about the mission trip to China this summer.”

“That’s cool.  How many people from Jeromeville are going to China?”

“Twelve.”

“Wow.  That’s so cool.”

When we arrived, we were assigned lanes 5 and 6.  I put on the rental bowling shoes and went to find a ball, and when I got back, the others had already divided into two groups.  Haley, Ramon, Kristina, Lorraine, and Clint were on lane 5, and I was on lane 6 with Eddie, Tabitha, John, and Jason.  I bowled a strike on my first frame and high-fived the others in my lane.  I then returned to my seat, but that strong opening did not carry through to the rest of the game.  I finished with a score of 111, very average for me.

I looked behind me at some point early in the second game, as I waited my turn.  Ramon and Haley sat at a table behind the bowling area; Ramon was talking about something, inaudible from my vantage point, as Haley listened intently, smiling, laughing occasionally.  Ramon and Haley took their turns in consecutive order on their lane, and after they finished, they returned to their more secluded table to look intently in each other’s eyes.

Being rejected was bad enough, but seeing Haley interested in someone else made the situation so much worse.  Haley’s actions were actively communicating that someone else was better than me.  Furthermore, I was not used to thinking of Ramon as a threat.  Ramon was in my dorm freshman year, and he and Liz Williams started dating just a couple weeks into the school year.  Ramon and Liz were the kind of couple who seemed destined to be the college sweethearts who stayed together forever, but they broke up at the beginning of this school year, after around two years together.  Ramon and Haley seemed to have grown close lately.  Ramon was the cool guy who spoke six languages and played all sorts of musical instruments, and his work had even been on the campus radio station recently.  But for most of the time I knew him, he had a girlfriend, and was not looking to meet girls like I was, so he and I were not in competition.

I was not mad at Haley.  She had done nothing wrong; she had been honest about not being interested in me.  And as much as I was envious of Ramon, he had done nothing wrong either.  I was mostly mad at myself, for not being good enough.  Obviously I had failed somewhere that Ramon had succeeded.  God had not allowed me to be Haley’s boyfriend, and Ramon seemed to have gotten farther than I ever did.  The Lord gave him the one he took from me, I thought.

Something clicked in my mind as that sentence formed.  The sentence was perfect iambic pentameter, like much of the work of William Shakespeare.  Every once in a while, when I am overthinking something or have too much on my mind, I will formulate a sentence that sounds particularly poetic, and the words will just keep coming.  Tonight, my mind was full of thoughts about Haley and Ramon: hearing Ramon’s music on the radio last week, growing apart from Haley, jealousy, anger, and following God’s will for my life even when it was not my own will.  I had been friends with Ramon for two and a half years, but I really did not think I could stay friends with him if he and Haley were together.  I did not want to talk to either of them right now. I did not want to look at them right now.   As I stepped to the lane to take my turn bowling, the words continued coming to mind, words in iambic pentameter, forming a Shakespearean sonnet.  I was distracted, knocking down five pins on my first roll and a gutter ball for the second.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” I said as I walked away from the bowling lanes.  After I used the toilet and washed and dried my hands, I pulled an extra paper towel out of the dispenser and brought it back to the lanes.  I sat a table behind the ball return machine, about six feet from the table where Ramon and Haley were still making googly eyes at each other, and began writing some of the words that had been filling my head.

I heard you on the radio and said,
This talented musician is my friend;
But this is just a lie; our friendship’s dead,
I’ve brought it quite abruptly to an end.

This poem had to be written addressed to Ramon.  The words were not working any other way.  The line I had thought of earlier had to be reworded, since it was in the third person; I almost wrote it next, for line 5, but decided it would come later, at line 7.  Another turn bowling interrupted my thoughts, but I returned to my table a few minutes later and continued writing.

Your life, your friends, your things, these things I see,
And anger builds within my jealous heart;
The Lord gave you the one he took from me,
And made our paths diverge so far apart.

I did not like “things” twice in line 5; I crossed out the first one and wrote “stuff.”  That did not sound very poetic either, but I never came up with a better word to go there.

“What’cha doin’, Greg?” Kristina asked, noticing me sitting alone.  “Writing poems on napkins?”

“Yeah,” I said, turning my paper towel over to hide what I had written from Kristina.

“My friends in high school, we used to do that all the time.  We wrote some pretty weird stuff.  I wonder if those napkins are still there, in my room back home?”

“I don’t know,” I said.  I really did not want to share this poem with anyone here.  Kristina walked to the lane to take her turn, not asking anything more about my poem.

Gradually, through the rest of the second game, I finished my poem:

I pray now for forgiveness; I repent,
I lift my sin to Jesus Christ above;
I’d like our path to go where it once went,
And happiness I wish you and your love.
God’s plan for me is not His plan for you,
So I will be myself, and your friend too.

Now all it needed was a title.  The poem was clearly written to Ramon, but I could not use his name, or Haley’s name, anywhere within.  After my next bowling turn, I moved back down to the seats by the ball return machine, with the poem in my pocket.

“Greg?” Eddie asked.  “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I said.  Eddie knew about my feelings for Haley, so I hoped that he would not ask any more about this.  He did not.

Toward the end of the bowling game, the title came to me: “Dear Mr. Q.”  Ramon literally was Mr. Q, his last name was Quintero, but also the name Mr. Q sounded mysterious.  I pulled the poem back out of my pocket and wrote the title at the top.

Because I was so distracted, I only bowled 101 that game, just barely keeping alive my streak of triple-digit bowling scores.  Although I did not bowl particularly often, I had not bowled below 100 since November of 1995, when I was taking the bowling class.

I studied for finals all weekend, feeling discouragement and self-loathing hanging over me.  The two math finals were straightforward, and I had no trouble with them.  Nutrition and Writings of John were a bit more challenging, since they consisted of memorizing facts and writing essay questions.  Professor Hurt had at least given us the topics of the essay questions in advance so that we could take time to prepare, but I had missed the last class to see Return of the Jedi.  I did the best I could in Nutrition, and only one question on the Writings of John final related to the class I missed.

I had a retreat coming up with Jeromeville Christian Fellowship the weekend after finals, Spring Breakthrough.  This was different from past retreats I had been on with JCF; instead of going somewhere up in the mountains, we were just spending a few days at a church in Stockdale, about an hour drive south down the Valley from Jeromeville.  I looked forward to it, though. Brian, my roommate who loved Star Wars, was on staff with JCF, and I had seen him copying clips from his Star Wars VHS tapes to use as illustrations.  He had explained that the topic of this retreat would be discipleship.  I had experienced the beginnings of discipleship, when my Christian friends from freshman year had prayed for me on rough days and invited me to JCF, and when Eddie had repeatedly reached out to me sophomore year.  But now that I was more involved with the group and had made a decision to follow Jesus, I felt less important to these people, and I felt that I would never have a girlfriend as long as I was on the outside of these cliques, or at best on the periphery.

When I talked to Haley three months ago and let her reject me, I was hoping that her definitive answer would close the door and help me get over her.  The events of that night at the bowling alley showed clearly that this had not happened.  Maybe I would never be over Haley until I got interested in someone else to that extent.  I knew of a lot of cute girls, but I was currently not close enough with anyone not already in a relationship to develop into the kind of crush I had on Haley.  Of course, when I did find someone, the new girl would probably just reject me as well, or meet someone else first, and the cycle would begin all over again. Something needed to change.

Author’s note: Tell me in the comments about a time you skipped class.

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