when Facebook is a winner

We still haven’t done the precise math to determine if it was fifteen years ago or sixteen.

I’m sure it’s irrelevant.

It was the year Kevin and I worked together teaching at the same small school in Virginia.

That’s when we met Rodney.

A tenth grader. (Or maybe a ninth grader?) He was just one of those kids who stands out. In the best of ways. Already an independent thinker. Seemingly unimpressed with entering the woes and dramas that some kids believe is a rite of passage in the teenage years.

Kind. Intelligent. Polite.

A good kid.

The kind of kid we were glad to see try out for soccer the year Kevin coached. The kind of kid who wrote essays you actually wanted to read. The kid who finished the real novel and not the Cliff’s Notes.

Rodney.

We taught at that school one year. And then everyone moved on.

And so did the years.

The week before we went hammock camping I requested to borrow a few extra hammocks. I used a Facebook status as my megaphone for the request.

Lo and behold – Rodney says he has a hammock.

Which started a conversation which led to the realization that we currently live in the same general geographic location of one another which led to making plans to dine together.

Virginians in South Carolina connecting through Facebook.

The last time we saw Rodney he was in the throes of adolescence, we were child less, he couldn’t grow a beard and our names were Mr. and Mrs. Keigley.

Suddenly, on the night of the multiple tornado warnings, Rodney and his beautiful bride wheeled their rig into our water logged driveway.

Fifteen years later. (Or sixteen. Whatever.)

Not only was Hope’s carrot cake delicious – and it was – the whole evening was just splendid.

They are expecting their first baby. We talked about baby names. And jobs. And the time in between Then and Now. And novels and worms composting in their bathroom and our old house and relationships and raising rabbits for meat. About families and baby carriers, black snakes and dogs that are family.

And in so many ways grown up Rodney was exactly as I thought he should be.

He had a hard time calling me Lacey – as any Southern gentleman would. I’d almost forgotten ever being Mrs. Keigley to a wealth of people.

Kevin and I felt truly honored to entertain Rodney and Hope for an evening – this tiny window of time.

The closest thing to a time machine we’ve known in a long time.

And although remembering a high school student and having dinner with a married soon-to-be-father made me feel every bit as old as I am, it also made me feel downright blessed too.