People, like coffee, are complicated. I spend too much time sipping both.

The past week has found me many opportunities to meet folks who I used to know. And to learn about what they’ve been up to since I stopped knowing them. And it seems to vary based only on when I knew them. If they went to highschool with me then they live within 30 miles of their parents, finished college but not much more, and are either married or parenting illegitimate children.

However, if they were from college then they live on one of the coasts, dress relatively sharply, and have at least two very interesting stories to tell you over drinks.

The problem with this is that I’m not so sure that these impressions reflect the truth of the matter. It seems that they have a lot more to do with me and my measures of success. Meaning that I am happy to know that my formative-year friends have achieved less success than I estimate that I have because at the time I felt so insecure and clueless. However, once I arrived in college I was a bit more directed and so it is easier for me to allow those individual to remain interesting in their current lives. And to introduce myself in my current costume.

But what I would really be interested to know is how I am perceived by these people. Will F talk to R (whom I ran into at Bob Evans) and be as pleased to know that I’m a librarian living with my boyfriend in Chicago as I am to hear that he’s a fat father living in Terre Haute? For me it is total spite and revenge that gives me pleasure to know that my unrequited lover in high school is no longer attractive to me. Do I now officially fit his image of a faggot or fruit who he stopped talking to once he realized I was gay? Does it bring him pleasure or revulsion? Or, worst case scenario, does he simply not care at all?

Either way, it was nice to see all of my friends again. It is good to know that history evolves and exists. And, in many cases, it is good to imagine that history again becoming my present. Picking up where I left off with those wonderful gems from college who inspired me then and are doing so again.