"Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save."

Right after graduation I started working at an outlet store in our brand spanking new outlet mall.
It was a new store so the merchandise wasn't even on the shelves when I and several others showed up on our first day.

I was looking forward to this new opportunity just out of high school. I was sick of the whole Lord of the Flies mentality of high school and was looking forward to meeting new, mature people.

I remember getting there pretty early and I watched as all the other new employees walked in, one by one. I examined the new faces wondering if I'd end up liking them. Would they be jerks? Would we get along?
That's when I saw her. Kay. I knew exactly who she was since the third grade. She was a year older than me but everyone in school knew her.
Kay was beautiful and uber popular.
I thought I inwardly rolled my eyes but later she told me I did it outwardly.

What I didn't know was that she was nervous about the first day and when she saw me, she was relieved. She knew someone!

Well...we didn't know each other but we knew of each other. But that was good enough for both of us.
I tried avoiding her, I think but it didn't take long for us to become friends.
I, of course, was totally wrong about her. I just judged her by the people she hung out with.
We started hanging out together and met lots of other people. We instantly connected to two new friends, JT and Edwin.
The four of us were inseparable. It seemed like every weekend or week night, we were doing something together.
Well...not always together. Sometimes, Edwin would get traded out for another friend of JT, Pudge.
Kay and I were torn between Edwin and Pudge. Edwin was chronically unemployed so whenever we went out, we all took turns paying for him. If Pudge went with us, because he was "pudge" he'd block the a/c vents in the car so Kay and I would die from heat stroke in the backseat.

Eventually, Edwin won out because he was more pleasant to hang out with and Kay and I hated to sweat!

We had so many adventures, the four of us but like so many friendships, life took over and we all went our separate ways.
Kay and I stayed close although we don't see each other nearly enough.
We both stayed in infrequent contact with JT but in the last couple of years we three talk more often.
Kay is married with a daughter and JT has a 13 yr old son.

Yesterday, we spent hours emailing each other back and forth. All three of us were at work but obviously not much work got done.
We started talking about old times and as usual JT couldn't remember something and Kay and I jumped all over him for having such a bad memory.
His excuse: "It happened 17 years ago!!!"

Whoa. That stopped me in my tracks. 17 years ago.
How could I be old enough to be talking about "old times" which happened nearly 20 years ago?
I don't feel like I'm much older than 20 myself.
Where did all this time go?
The concept of years passing and time marching forward is so huge to me that I can't really comprehend it.

I feel like life is going by too fast. I want it to slow down a little. Not because I want to get off...I just want to stand still for a little while.