so all my phone calls have officially been elevated to super freaking important status.
that’s because i recently got the ring tone from the CTU office. you know, from the show 24. (which can be heard here). i was inspired to the action by my recent viewing of all of season three of 24 and my lovely co-worker.
ok. so we all know that whenever the phone rings at the counter-terrorism unit, the matter is of LIFE AND DEATH! and now, every time i get a call, i race to grab my crackberry and answer with the urgency of a fireman rushing into a burning elementary school on pre-k visitation day.
“HELLO!” i say, slightly out of breath from the adrenaline rush. “THIS IS CRYSTAL.”
i figure the ring tone will be a good way to remind me that really, any call could be important.
it’s the kind of thing i wish i’d had when my friend Bob called me that one time back in college. maybe then i wouldn’t have been so stupid.
that was back before i knew that people died. well, i mean obviously i knew people passed away, but that they died? that’s never really clear to a person until they experience it. and i was a twit 20-year old back then who never had to hear the news that their first love on this earth was going to be buried in the ground for eternity.
and so, before i knew that about the world my friend Bob called. he had actually been trying to track me down for a while and had finally found a number for a main desk at college, and asked them for my dorm phone number. and at last, he was able to reach me. but like i said, i was a twit 20-year-old, and treated the phone call like the thousands of others i had with him.
like it wasn’t the last time i’d get to talk to him. and i even had the nerve to get angry with him about some lame money issue and we argued until he hung up.
and because he’d had been the one to track me down, i didn’t even have a way to get back in touch with him.
and then, three weeks later he died.
and all of a sudden i was no longer a twit 20-year-old, unaware of the fact that people die. i was changed down to my bones. i was hyper aware. the idea of it all even managed to crush my spirit down to a fine powder for awhile, until i regained my footing in the new world with my new knowledge.
and i still miss him with every beat of my heart in my chest. i still feel a rush of memories whenever i do things like pass the car wash where the two of us kissed, or drive down the road we walked along that night i snuck out to see him.
but now, at least, i know better.
i know that really, any call could be super freaking important.
