My How Far We've Come

The other morning while lounging in bed, listening to KPBS and catching up on the news and dreaming and floating between that space that is awake and asleep, I heard something about an attorney named Amy Lepine running against Mike Aguirre for San Diego city attorney....

I am not technically in the city of San Diego anymore (just a mile north of the line) and I can't vote in the city anymore so I only half pay attention to what's going on "down there." When I heard this announcement, in that floating space, I thought to myself, "hmmm. I used to know an Amy Lepine....." and my mind began to wander way back. To college, the first time around. Mira Costa College to be specific.

I thought about my friend Karin Zirk, who is still one of my dearest and bestest friends and how I tutored her in Spanish. I remembered Gloria Floren's "world" literature class, which should have been titled women's literature (not that there's anything wrong with that) because every book we read was written by a woman. I think it was Ms. Floren's way of balancing the literary scales.... Anyway, Amy Lepine was in that class with me and Karin was in the class too. It may have been where I met Amy, I don't know. It was a long time ago. It was a required English credit and I think I skated by with a C.

Several days passed before I thought of Amy Lepine again, or read something in the paper and google girl that I am, set about to figure out if this was indeed the same Amy I knew. And it was. It is. Amy Lepine, Attorney At Law.

There's a few things about Amy I remember, most revolve around having fun as college students are apt to do. I am not sure why we lost touch. Maybe we were just friends of convenience, of a time and a place. We both went to San Diego State University, but took different paths from there.

Gloria Floren is still at Mira Costa College... and while she may be suprised at where we are now, me going off to get an MFA in creative writing, Karin a talented writer and an environmental activist and Amy preparing to go up against Aguirre, I think she might be proud of all of us.