By Staff
The other day at work I got a surprising phone call from a friend I hadn't heard from in probably at least 10 years.
We had gone to the first two years of college together in Saint Charles, Ill.
She and I are nearly in the baby boomer stage, where some of our friends are retiring.
A very talented artist, this woman had just quit her job and decided to become a freelance graphic artist.
I remember we walked over to the other building from the dorm every morning for our art classes, hardly awake.
The head of the art department, a nun who demanded more than any other teacher I ever had, made sure our classes were always the first thing in the morning.
I envied this girl, she had so much talent.
This week I learned she envied me, as she thought I had so much confidence.
We talked about a movie we produced while at Saint Dominic's. I remember a pregnant nun in it – shocking that we would be so bold.
I think I was dressed as a farmer's daughter, with a straw hat, pigtails and large freckles, possibly with a lollipop.
It was crazy, wild and we felt wonderfully free of parents and sanctions for the first time in our lives. It was the '60s after all.
I was lucky to have a single room with its own bathroom, but she had to share. Her first roommate was literally a pig, with clothes thrown every which way, food left out and nothing put away or organized.
My friend Colleen, on the other hand, was closer to compulsive. It looked like someone had drawn an imaginary line down the center of the room, with one side as neat as a pin and the other the pigsty.
It was a difficult situation, as her roommate was African American. Both of us had grown up in homes which were tolerant of all people, no matter what color or religion.
I remember she was extremely good about not turning this into a race issue.
We became friends and double dated and eventually married within two weeks of one another.
I returned from my honeymoon to attend her wedding.
She had been thinking about me, she said and decided to Google me.
We both had fathers who were involved in politics, hers in Chicago and mine the mayor of a small town in the suburbs.
"I found your father right away," she said, even though he has been dead for nearly 30 years. Then one of my columns must have popped up and she suddenly had my e-mail and phone information.
What fun to pick right back up.
We told what our children were doing, though in my mind I still see her feeding her first daughter, one of the very first newborns I had ever seen.
Later, when they visited when I had my son less than a year later, I was amazed at this little girl who walked and talked and wasn't even a year old.
Now I found out she lives with her husband in Scotland.
Another girl from that same college also found me recently, reading my columns in California.