Random Thoughts

My friend and I used to collect quotes in high school and write them down in books so that we could reread them when they applied to our lives. We would post them on the walls of our rooms and later, as I began to teach, I would write one on the board every morning just to give my high school students something to ponder while I took attendance and got class rolling. This week, two of my favorites came back to me:

• "Never grow a wishbone, daughter, where a backbone ought to be." -- Clementine Paddleford

and

• "Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: What! You, too? I thought I was the only one." -- C.S. Lewis

My best friend, my life-long pal, Kasey, and I were Seinfeld fans before the show was ever popular, when the ratings were so bad that no one could have predicted that it would be the phenomenon it ended up being. I remember sitting on the phone with her in high school while the shows were on and laughing at the episodes, each from our separate rooms and separate houses. We followed each season and have often referred to particular times in our lives as "something that would have happened on Seinfeld"--those kind of weird, surreal moments that are only funny because they just should never happen. One of the episodes that probably everyone has seen is about Festivus, the made-up holiday where everyone gets together and airs their grievances for the past year. Probably everyone should do this at least once if for no other reason than the insight about oneself it can provide.