Sweet 16

My cousin Rachel is 16 years old today. I just called her in Greece (her dad is teaching in Athens on a fullbright for the semester and they’ve been there since January). How did that happen??? I remember my sweet 16 being a lot less than 7 years ago! Rachel and Daniel were at my party actually. They happened to be in philly visiting that week. Rachel was 9 and Daniel was only 4 and they came and shot pool with me and my friends. I remember feeling so grown up at 16. The world was my oyster and I’d finally arrived. 16 meant freedom. Learning to drive. And I’d finally lost all that weight and looked like a normal teenager. 16 was also the year I lost Sarah as a best friend and gained my own sense of self back. And I met Meghan. 16 was a good year for me and I hope it is even better for Rachel. She’s so grown up it’s amazing. And so well rounded too. She’s tremendously smart, has now travelled the world, sings like a dove, dances like an angel, is kind an compassionate, pitched for the overseas greek softball team and is stunningly beautiful to boot. Aunt Jill sent us pictures of her dressed up for a formal. I showed it to Robert and he was like “That’s little Rachel! Damn I feel old.” — Happy birthday Sweet 16.

And happy 23 also to TrigunnerX. (June birthdays rock!)

_________________________________________________________

I called the FAFSA people today and it seems I could have just gotten there from the main page with a few simple clicks of the mouse. Likely going to be a $5,000 mistake for me. But there’s nothing i can do about it now. I called financial aid but of course couldn’t get a person so who knows. But at least now i can fax them the damn SAR report and they’ll be out of my hair for another year. Anyway, time to write in my real journal now which I’ve been sorely neglecting. It’s been nice having this down time today before work to just chill in the airconditioning. And it’s been a productive downtime. Meg called at 10:40 this morning thinking my cell would be off. Her….whatever he is…..Damion is gonna be at the ball game tonight so I might get to meet him. So I’ve been up considerably earlier than usual but it’s been a good thing. Jason Preistly was on the The View this morning which I normally would have slept through. It was funny to look back on it and see how silly and gaga I was over him at 13 when he was on 90210. And Lisa Ling (anyone remember channel one??) was reliving the same thing as she and the other View girls were interviewing him about his latest independent film. It also meant that I was already really awake and functioning by noon instead of 1. Which means I’ve had more time to do the stuff I wanted to take care of I’m feeling less rushed and more relaxed before having to head off to work.

Ok, I’m really going now…

Steph