party like it's 1998

It's shaping up to be a nostalgic year.

There was the cripple phase back in January when I went through old diaries and memories (husband and I had dinner one night back then talking about 'potatoes and porn', namely how we'd prepared the potatoes we were eating and my long-buried recollection of finding a friend's parents' porn collection - unrelated but indicative of how immersed I was in dredging up old memories).

Then there was revisiting my friend Adam, the old schmuck boyfriend, a 40th birthday lunch with a friend I spent many, many a happy afternoon with when we were littlies - and have hardly seen since (she lives abroad).

I made her this card, which kind of summed us up - perpetually dressed up, rock scrambling and beach exploring in the playgrounds of our youth.

Blasts from the past have abounded, and I've really been enjoying it.

We think we remember so much, but in truth there are really a handful of well-worn memories that we remember over and over again. There is so much more lying dormant, there but unacknowledged, and sometimes it takes a person, a smell, a picture, a conversation or an event to nudge those moments out of hiding, and then it all comes flooding back.

Last Thursday I went to a party. A revival of the super-duper 'Pickle' parties of my Varsity days. '96 to '98 Pickle parties were our jol, our crowd, our beat, our playground. The friends who DJ-ed back then were back in town and arranged a reunion.
It was magic.

Packed with faces I knew, but hadn't seen for years. Thumping with music my body instantly knew how to move to - and did!
Everyone was happy to be there, everyone grateful to recapture a feeling - an intersection of emotional and physical memory. Everyone was smiling, Everyone got it.
I didn't have a single 'what are you doing now' conversation. I don't know about anyone's kids or lack there of, I don't know where they're living now or what their home-owners status is.
We just hugged, smiled, danced.
We just existed in a space where none of that was relevant.
Just like 1998.

A perfect resurrection for Easter weekend.