Today was my 27th Birthday.
DC hasn’t been the same since most of close friends left this past summer.
When I read Fred Wilson’s post about moving as a kid, I thought of my similar experiences moving multiple times while in grade school and high school. I viewed each of these moves as a chance to reinvent myself. In fact, I vividly recall feeling guilty for having bought a t-shirt that was the same one frequently worn by the most popular kid “Rickey,” at my old school. I think I even tried to replicate a few of his mannerisms – damn he was cool!
“Reinvention” is something I love to do: to take bits and pieces from one application, tweak, and then apply them in a new context. It drives a lot of people nuts to constantly operate in a state of flux, but that’s how I roll.
What was fun about this birthday was my realization that in many ways, despite all my tweaking, things ultimately come back full-circle. I’ve met so many people since I moved to DC and yet at the end of the night, there I was out at a bar with two people: 1) one of my best friends from freshman year in college (we lost touch for six years until he recently moved to DC) and 2) my most consistently loyal friend since I loved I to DC three plus years ago.
People and ideas can change, but the intangibles are what matter most.
Fittingly, I ended the night with a song that continuously reappears throughout my life. Round Here by the Counting Crows has been a favorite of mine ever since I recorded it on a cassette tape off the radio freshman year in high school. For those who have forgotten this amazing song or the defining 1990’s voice of Adam Duritz, here it is in full YouTube glory:
Thanks to everyone who wrote, called, Im’d, emailed, texted and the one guy who sent a card via courier!
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