Dreams, Goals and Other Imaginary Beasts

I went to my friend A.M.'s wedding this weekend. Her, me and B all lived together in 3rd year. We did things like taping signs to B's back while shopping in Jysk, making casseroles out of whatever we happened to have in the house, and hosting parties that you had to dress up as a fake superhero, complete with a unique superpower, to attend. I was The Plague, B was Passive Aggressive Girl and AM was Master Debater. Also in attendance were such greats as Corporate America (a supervillan), Crazy Tennis Playing Guy and The Highlighter. AM's car used to break down about once a month and I remember using the fact that her battery constantly died as an excuse to talk to the guy I liked who lived across the parking lot.

B and I wrote a toast to give at the wedding and while doing that spent about an hour sitting around and reminiscing about that year and the rest of our times in nursing school. It all seems so long ago, but really first year was only 2004. Its weird that some things have stuck so much and others have faded out. I only remember parties at "The Party Quad" these days when I am consciously thinking about them. But I still call T Treeesh, and spell it out with 3 E's every time. B and I still involuntarily quote Jimmy Falon whenever we walk past the leather store in the Kamloops mall ("Eeehhhllleather).

What are this reminiscing boiled down to was one thought: just how much we all have changed. How weird is it that someone who taught me all I know about applying smokey eyeshadow and picked me up from work wearing a dress shoes, Pj pants and a towel on her head just got married? It's definitely strange that the girl who's fish tried to die every time you looked at it just bought a house, with spare rooms that I can stay in if I ever pass through town. Sometimes I just don't know what to do with the fact that the world is growing up around me. Every time I turn around another of my friends is getting married. Everyone I know seems to own a house, a dog and a new car. I can list off 5 people that I went to school with that either are pregnant, are trying to get pregnant or have had a kid in the last year.

Sometimes all this change gets a little overwhelming and starts to get me questioning my choices in life up to right now. It seems like everyone else is going the regular "mature adult" route, while I seem to be hacking my own path through the underbrush. Yet I never doubt that what I'm doing is right for me when I'm bouncing along a dusty road in Cambodia in the back of a pick up truck, holding two Cambodian babies and sharing coconut rice out of a bamboo tube with a toothless old lady. Even when I'm upside-down in a river in Nepal and semi-convinced that I'm about to drown I know that each near-death experience is going to be something I will never regret. The only thing that makes me question myself is sitting in a room decorated with tulle and fake ivy, twinkle lights and a cake on a pedestal, surrounded by people that are so happy that someone else in their lives has reached this adult milestone.

I guess it turns out that aspirations are kind of like perfume. If you spend enough time surrounded by someone else's dreams (especially when they are on display as conspicuously as a wedding, kinda like dumping a bottle of perfume over your head) you start to wear it, and for awhile it almost seems right for you. Then you get back out into the open air and realise: I smell like a rose garden. When in my life have I ever wanted to smell like crushed gardenias? The scent of vanilla pods and lilies may seem grownup and classy, but what if I really like smelling like raspberry body mist?