I decided to write Fall of 1999 to August of 2001, when I lived in Columbus, Ohio. Some hard or stressful things happened those years, which is what I tend to think about when I look back, but a lot of joy and excitement was there, too.
- I lived with my friend, Kim, for the first year and my orange cat, Louise. We lived in a cute apartment in Victorian Village and ate packaged Cesar Salad kids watched Friends, and drank shots of Bailey’s Irish Cream regularly.
- My parents got tickets to Broadway shows in Cleveland and they’d get an extra for me and I’d drive home for the weekend.
- I had my first years of what would turn into a lifetime of working with Somali students.
- I had a Somali teacher’s assistant, Fowziya. I loved her. She would call me her American sister and she lent me a traditional Somali dress to wear to the women’s party for her wedding.
- The excitement of buying things for my very first classroom.
- A friend named Barbara I had. We’d take kickboxing classes at the OSU gym and then watch Ally McBeal.
- The joy of Thursday night TV in 1999- Friends and ER.
- Taking a Spring Break trip to visit my brother in Tucson, Arizona, before either of us had kids.
- Meeting my friends from Prague in Ann Arbor for the weekend.
- How exciting it used to be to go out and drink too much and talk to people I’d never see again.
- When Easton Mall opened, and how exciting going there with my friend, Barbara was.
- All the places that have become boring chains now, that were so exciting then – Panera, Starbucks, Caribou, Bruegger’s Bagels.
- The excitement of dating someone new.
- I loved dating people from other cultures. I dated guys from Serbia, India, Jordan, Russia, Korea, and a few Americans. My friend’s husband laughed that I was dating the UN.
- Teaching for CPS, I got to take free classes at Ohio State.
- The teaching mentors that I found, people that were probably my age now that took time to help me.
- How open and filled with excitement the world seemed.
- Going to my friend Barbara’s apartment building’s pool in the summer, laying out all day, and then going to the Dollar Movie theater.
- The pretty salon where I had my hair died blonde and bought huge bottles of Aveda Shampoo.
- Driving home to Akron for the weekend and going shopping with my mom at our favorite thrift store.
