This One's for Kelly

I'm SURE you already know by now that Kelly, of She's in Transition, recently featured me in all my former-cheerleader glory on her blog. I don't know how she found out I was a cheerleader in a former life. I guess it might've been part of our pre-nuptual preparation or something, since we just know that if we ever manage to meet in real life, we're gonna be, like, way tight. ("Way-ay-ay-ay TIGHT!" *hold-2-3-4*)

Sorry. Sometimes my alter-cheerleader-ego appears at the oddest times.

The universe tends to work in mysterious ways though, and the recent reappearance of my old cheerleading photos, among other ancient childhood artifacts, was quite appropros in more than one way.

The teenage daughter of a friend found her mom's old eye glasses, put them on, and made a video for Facebook that worked along the lines of, "I wonder whose glasses these are? These big, dorky glasses? How do I look? Whose could these be?" I cringed for my friend and left a comment along the lines of "Sweet Jesus - keep those girls away from my childhood bedroom closet!"

Then an old friend posted my Sheena Easton wannabe photo, quite out of the blue, on his facebook page, unleashing quite the firestorm of comments.

And then, as if on cue, my mom showed up at my front door with 3 armloads of stuff. Old stuff. From my childhood bedroom closet. OY.

The pile sat. It sat 3 feet inside my front door for several days before I could muster the courage to take a look. And the odd thing is no one else noticed the pile even existed. This amazing feat - that my 3 boys can be so oblivious to a change in their surroundings - can be both a blessing (there were old love letters in there) and a curse (they'll step over an obstacle course of strewn items without ever noticing, much less picking anything up).

And so it was really only another bit of karmic magic that Kelly's cheerleader post appeared when it did. Somebody, somewhere, is having a good laugh.

The other day, home-bound with a sinus infection that could choke a walrus, I finally peeked into the stash of old memories. Several things were immediately used to stoke the woodburning stove. (Dear gawd, did I pledge my undying love for HIM?!?) (Ew!) (Double Ew!) (Like, ew to the fifth power!)

But others... others elicited sighs, laughter, and amazement. We thought we'd never forget those things. And yet... I did. I forgot about almost all of it.

So this one's for you, Kelly. (Cue Budweiser jingle.) For loving me even though I was a cheerleader in a former life.

My mom had the BEST idea. She suggested I hang all these old photos on a wall in our newly finished basement.

Rob just got one of those looks when I suggested it... one of those looks that suggest he just smelled something rather foul...