Top 5: People From My Past That I’d Like to Meet Again

Every now and then I am reminded of individuals from my past. I have lost touch with all of these people, and while I may not have had a relatively long life span in their circle, I think it would be pretty neat if they were still around or if we got together for a bottle of 151. So as a tribute to these memorable faces from my past, I brand them as the Top 5 people from my past that I’d like to meet again. Here we go…

1) Eddie – I had just moved – more like my family moved and I went where they went – to a new town. It was Novemeber during 5th grade. I had moved enough times before, so being “the new kid” didn’t phase me too much. Who am I kidding? I hated it! I went into terrible depressions, losing all my friends every year and a half. Sigh! Anyways, being the new kid wasn’t so bad this time around, largely because there was another new kid who started the same day as me. His name was Eddie. And the only thing I liked about him at first was he was smaller than me. I hated being the smallest kid in class. So now, Eddie would have to share half the grunt of this label. In high school, we formed a small group of your average happy-go-lucky type of guys who sometimes found themselves in troublesome situations. There were five of us, and we called ourselves the ‘GoodFellas.’ C’mon, you know you’ve all had a cool-sounding name for your childhood entourage. Actually, if you have, I’d be interested to know what you named yourselves! Back to Eddi – we were best friends all the way to our senior year in high school. After which, I decided to go off to some place called ‘College” and he decided to stay back in town. I have only seen him twice since. Nevertheless, the point is, it would be cool if we were still ‘GoodFellas.’

2) Justin – or as I like to refer to him as Justa’ Just. Refrain from the wisecracks ok! It was my first year of college. And me being the free bird that I was, decided it was time to take over the world. Knowing full well that I could not do that alone, Justin was my new-found Bajan friend with a natural appetite for good times and fine drinking (and other stuff not particularly kosher). We were very similar and as I look back today, we became good friends in a matter of a semester. From showing our dorm neighbors how loud the music can get, how late the after-party can last, and how many straight nights of boozing would result in eviction notices from the dorms, Justin and I had a blast. Heck….we even had some run-ins with the law, a few fists, and some frats. Good times I tell you. It would have been smart for us to concentrate on our academic careers, but that would get in the way of taking over the world. Regardless, I remember branding a few of our college buddies as “GoodFellas” as well. Notice a pattern? There were 8 of us that first year. And I must say, it was a very internationally diverse group. Let’s see, we had 5 crazy Indos, 1 Bajan, 1 white-boy, and 1 Latin. We were poster-boys for educational diversity at the institution. Anyways, I haven’t seen Justin for a few years now, and I wonder what he’s been up to. Last I heard, he was working at a law firm. I’m sure he has matured some, as I have. But I don’t think it would feel like we had missed a beat if I were to see him again at the bars.

3) An Old Boss – She (Marisa) was my boss when I worked at GE as part of one of those leadership programs where you rotate into a new group every 6 months. I had just graduated and this being my first job out of college ( I had many while I was in college) really prepared me for the corporate world. She was Chief Security Officer (CSO) of GE Capital (which included approx. 20 businesses within it). So the exposure of reporting to someone at her level was great. Little did I know that the 4 months I spent working for Marisa would define where I am today. She was a no-nonsense type of woman who didn’t care how old or how new you were. She gave you the task and you went and performed. Nothing less and nothing more. No baby-sitting at all. The first day she handed me my project for the rotation – it was a global deployment of host-based security software on all of GE Capital’s servers – and I was the project manager. Not having ever managed a project from end-to-end, this was a great experience. Additionally, I would be supported by a team of techies located across the globe in some fantastic tech hub called India. So there were times when the time difference required me to stay late into the night for conference calls. Also, it was difficult to have them do what I asked considering I was much younger and inexperienced. Being 21 at the time, she challenged me to complete this project successfully, and she never got involved. I would go to her for advice when I needed it and she was awesome in providing explanations and guidance. But other than that, it was my show to run. I loved the feeling and it kept me sharp and on my toes every day at work. As I look back at that, I realize it was her belief in me and her no-nonsense attitude that has subconsciously inspired and led me to a career as a project manager today. It’s been two years now, and I wonder if she even remembers me. Maybe I should write her a belated thank-you email. Maybe I’ll just brand her on this blog entry.

4) Joel, the Travel Guide – My friend Ron and I randomly decided to pack up and go to Belize about a year and half ago. Having never been there, we decided to hire a travel guide. Through referrals from the hotel and some lady at an antique store, we met Joel. If you saw him, you would never think he was a tour guide. In fact, you would probably be scared. Regardless, we hired him as our personal tour guide for 3 days (are we ballers or what?). He would pick us up in the morning at our hotel in his 12 passenger van. And we’d drive off to whatever random place Ron and I wanted to go. Some destinations and advetnures included exploring and climbing Mayan ruins, smoking Cuban cigars on top of them, cave tubing, howler monkey watching, trying to cross over to Guatemala unsuccessfully (border patrol realized the whiteboy Ron didn’t look Guatemalan), bar crawling through remote villages, eating lunch in random people’s backyard barbecues, and fleeing a strip club due to the horror. You missed out! I’m telling you it was fun. Anyways, Joel was real cool. He would bring a cooler filled with Kalik beer and we would drink from morning to night. Luckily, it was so hot in Belize, we sweated it out real quickly. I would say that after those three days hanging out with Joel, we became friends, rather than customers. Of course, we still took care of the guy with a hefty $100 tip. Hell, it was well-deserved! I remember when he dropped us off at the airport and started getting all emotional. We told him we would send him pictures of the trip for some web site he wanted to create. Unfortunately, neither Ron nor I am very good at following up on what we say. I hope Joel isn’t still waiting for those pictures.

5) FishBowl Team – During college, I worked on this team called the Morgan Online team for about 9 months. We sat in a glass-encased room called the “fish bowl” and no one could hear what we were saying. But they could see in from the outside of all four walls. Our job was to answer phone calls from really really rich people (over 25 million buckaroos in an account). We would help these schmucks navigate through our web site and look up their financial info and calculate net worth. Sometimes, we would have to teach these chumps how to turn on their computer and find the blue “e” on their desktop. Let’s just say you needed plenty of patience to work in this room.The coolest part of talking on the phones was that we had those cool headsets and really long extension cords which allowed us to play golf while we waited for the customer to find the “Start” button. It was still pretty neat because there were like 7 of us in there, and we were all hard-core pranksters and techies. Let’s see there was Jimbo, Eric, Thomas, Marius, and some others. We got along really well and they were definitely some of the more fun individuals I have worked with throughout my career. I remember when we weren’t on the phone, we built super computers, designed web sites, learned how to use Flash (back when it was cool), and made fun of each other. Good times, I tell you. I haven’t spoken to any of these individuals for roughly 4 years. I know they still remember me, but we are all located in different states. Everyone parted ways, and I wonder what they are up to now.

There are others that just came to mind, but I’d rather not re-do this entry. After all, isn’t it always better when you just go with the initial draft?

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Posted by Charlie P on Mar 4 2005. Filed under Entertainment, Headline, Lists, Live, Play, Sex + Women, Sports, Stories, Style, Travel + Places, Work. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry