Matchbox 20

On the way to work today, after I had dropped off Moodle and could turn off the nursery rhyme CD that plays on endless loop when I need to distract her, I heard a song I haven't heard in at least a decade.

There are lots of songs I haven't heard in at least a decade, but this song gave me a little tingly feeling. It was "Push" by Matchbox 20. It's a good song, but not really special in its own right. But that song came out the summer before I went to college. The first summer I spent in Pennsylvania, just after we moved. The summer before the biggest adventure of my life, college. The summer I spent a lot of time in my beat up Reliant, learning my way around in between shifts at the Lone Star. The summer I listened to a lot of radio.

I remember feeling a sense of anticipation that stuck with me the entire summer. I remember feeling a little lonely, because all my friends were in a different state. But it didn't bother me too much. After all, I reasoned, I would have left those friends behind to go to college anyway. Mostly, I just felt an electricity that had nothing to do with the tired old town we had moved to. An eagerness to go to school, prepared, focused, and as awesome as I could be.

And when I heard that song this morning, I got to feel that electricity again, this time flavored by what actually happened in college, which made it sweeter. And now I miss all the great friends I made in college, especially the ones I made while that song was still on the radio.