There are two main reasons we made this trip to the East Coast. One reason is the family reunion. The other reason is that my college partner-in-crime, Alicia, was getting married. I knew this would be hectic. However, I could not make it a one-event trip. My kids needed to see their cousins, and I needed to see my friend. I had to make both happen.
In college, Alicia and I were in several common classes during our first and second years. Those were was the years the PT and OT students took most of the same classes, and that is when I met Alicia. I can remember chatting with her over the college BBS, and she seemed a little nuts. I realized I could get to like this girl. I was taking philosophy classes at the time, hoping to get a philosophy minor, and Alicia mentioned that she was taking a class in existentialism with my Ethics and Latin professor. So I sat in on the class for the semester.
For the next 2 years, Alicia and I wreaked havoc on the school, or at least we did in our own minds. There was a particularly awkward professor, who helped me form a foreign film club, who was the target of much of our antics. One day we were politely sitting in his office as he brewed espresso on his Bunsen burner, and the next we were distracting him to steal his keys and make copies, and the next night we entered his office to fill it full of balloons, or tape eerie pictures to his office door. We showed up to these shenanigans masked.
I think he appreciated the attention, but he was a little horrified that his keys (as well as the keys to the building) had been so easily stolen and copied. We admitted to nothing.
Alicia was the kind of person who could match my energy and mind. I could call her up at midnight to hang out, and she was always up for studying with me. We were both the kinds of students who could study hard, get the best grade in our class, and still have time left over to play pool at the local coffee shop until the sun rose. We practically lived on Wilson Farms coffee and thought we were so grown up. We road tripped to NYC or Niagara Falls or anywhere in between on a whim, whenever that whim came upon us. We were both a little punk, Alicia favored combat boots and bright blue hair, and dog collars (and so I began to call her Aleasha…like she should be lead around by a leash…Oh, my…), and I favored shocking people by showing up in medusa braids, a corset top, and shorty shorts in a blizzard. We were so weird. Life was grand. Those were good days. People long for their high school years, but I would instead jump back to those college years in a heartbeat.
Then Alicia got married. She had a baby. She was my first friend to have a baby. I now spent spare weekends between exams traveling to Virginia to visit Alicia and her new baby. He was so cute. I remember that he laughed so easily, even as a tiny baby, and he loved snuggles. Then they moved to California, and I only saw them on vacations. I had lost to distance the only person who seemed to truly get me. But I was then dating Brandon, and he had moved to Buffalo, so it seemed like a good time to get serious about that relationship.
A lot of life has happened to us both in the years between then and now. A lot. We kept up with one another, and we saw one another a few times, even though we lived thousands of miles apart. I hoped that Alicia’s story would end well, and that things would get easier and easier for her over time. And it did. Alicia is a strong woman success story. She raised two spirited children as a single mother. She bought a house. She put herself through school several times over to better her financial situation. She fostered her children’s interests and was present with them. And she took time to keep herself sane.
So when Alicia told me she was about to get married a second time, I kind of FB stalked this guy for a while, and he seemed like maybe a good match. He seemed to put up with and adore her extreme quirks. He was thoughtful of her, and not only at the beginning of their relationship. Months and years in, he was still kind to her. She seemed really content and calm with him. So when she asked me to stand with her as a bridesmaid, I was overjoyed.
I am sure Alicia would disagree, but I thought it was the perfect wedding. She has married into a family that can match her nuttiness and energy. I think she may find peace in this marriage. She has many kind, attentive friends, as well as her angelic mother, to watch over her. Her wedding was so beautiful, and I have a million pictures to remember it by. Here are some of them:
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