1. Alex W. came to Lane Community College straight out of high school over fifteen years ago and enrolled in a Learning Community I was involved in and so was a student of mine. Alex and I had many great conversations in my office back then and we kept in touch, off and on, over the years after LCC through Facebook and email.
Alex left the Eugene-Springfield area and moved to Minnesota and Las Vegas, but recently returned to Springfield.
Knowing she was back in the area and that she was enrolled in a course back at LCC, I asked Alex if we could get together during my current visit to Eugene.
We could!
We met today near JJ Java, a coffee shop on the second floor of the Center building and yakked together for nearly two hours.
Since Alex was a student at LCC in her late teens, a lot has happened in her life -- she's now thirty-five.
She has two sons, she's a widow, she's lost family members to death, she's become active again in her church and with ceremonies and other tribal practices.
I was deeply impressed with how much Alex has grown as she's become an adult, how she's become wiser, more mature, resourceful, more open with herself and others about her experiences with grief, more open in sharing her gratitude, and, as always, I continued to be impressed with wit, intelligence, and shrewd observations.
We both felt much gratitude that through luck and pluck we were able to meet up this morning after not seeing each other for so many years.
It felt miraculous to me.
By the way, while we were sipping our espresso drinks and yakkin' away, I heard someone call my name. I looked up and it was a theater mate from long ago.
Dylan K.!
We had a brief and heartfelt exchange and it was a wonderful coincidence because Judy and I had just talked for a while about Dylan yesterday!
2. After Alex and I bid one another farewell, with hopes we'll see each other again before too long, I returned to the apartment I'm renting and got caught up on writing blog posts and took a rest.
I got cleaned up and headed to The Public House in Springfield where Ann and Russell had reserved a room called The Study for Russell's retirement party.
It was amazing.
I saw a whole bunch of people I've known for thousands of years but haven't seen recently at all.
The conversations, spirit in the room, food, the happiness for Russell all combined to make this a memorable celebration!
3. After the uplifting celebration at The Public House, many of us rocketed over to Whirled Pies in Eugene where Ann and Russell's son, Allie (drummer) and Jennifer's two sons, Jack and Charlie (electric guitar and bass -- I don't remember which son plays which instrument) performed with two other high school boys and their music teacher. Most of their set featured an abridged version of the Who's Tommy and they played another jazzier tune to conclude.
This was really fun!
I also, to my delight and surprise, got to see both Nate B. and Mary P. who were in attendance at Whirled Pies.
That made my head whirl!
An afterthought: When I arrived at Whirled Pies, an ensemble of women, with the boys' high school music teacher on drums, were playing awesome songs from the 80s. They told us in the audience the name of their group and I know the name had Ladies and 80s in the title, but I don't remember the exact name.
I enjoyed their positive energy, the fun they were having, and the sentimental feelings their song choices inspired in me as I listened.
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