Stay Streetsmart

After visiting Austin over spring break in 1990, I dropped out of KU and moved down here on January 5, 1991. Nine days later, a friend of mine who worked at Streetside Records in Lawrence wrote me a three-page letter and dropped it in the mail the same day.

For some reason, hand-writing in all capital letters isn’t disturbing like caps-lock emails are. Weird.

There’s something comforting about ruled notebook paper and an envelope that says, “I’m taking a break from my slightly-above-minimum-wage-job at the record store to write you a letter”, don’t you think?

In this letter, my friend told me that he and another friend were planning to come visit me over spring break 1991. Then they followed through a couple of months later and drove down to visit.

And we’re all still friends, more than two decades later. I suppose that’s one of the things I like best about growing older — old friendships.