After today, I realize that no matter how much I hold onto the past, I have to let go. Things change. People change. And it\’s more than I had imagined.

At Berkeley, I made some of the best friends I ever had. After I graduated, I always made the effort to keep in touch. A quick im. A short e-mail. A card. And most of all, I would drive to see them. Lunch or dinner.

But today, I drove to Santa Clara to see a friend who had graduated a year before I did. I had always made an effort to see her. She and I met in a linguistics class and after studying once, we basically hit it off. As a result, I was one of the top students in the class. Simply because of the people I met. We talked sporadically after that on im, kept in touch, complained about the current status of the boys, the usual everyday talk. She went off to work at various tech companies. I decided to go to grad school.

And so I finally got a chance after more than a year to meet up with her for dinner. And it was the strangest thing, it was incredibly awkward. I don\’t know whether it was because I had just come off an embarassing trip to the gas station (which I didn\’t discuss with her) or because of my one hour drive from Lafayette hitting pockets of traffic on the 880. But suddenly we couldn\’t find much to say. And the rest of the time, it was forced conversation. By the time the check arrived, I felt relieved. We didn\’t say anything as we paid our own portion. Then walked to the door, aimless talk, a moment of mycarisovertherebutyourcaristhere and a quick goodbye hug with an insincere \”i hope to see you again\”.

All I can think is that I still haven\’t grown up. That\’s all, right?