It was a warm day, late summer, in the early evening. The sun was out, deep in the sky, and I had just finished packing. I had my plane ticket for Allentown (ABE) to Dayton (DAY), with return trip two weeks later, in a hip bag. I had a few sets of clothing, some CDs, a framed photo I had taken earlier that year, and a few random bits of paraphernalia; nothing particularly notable.

I had just finished applying beeswax to my hair to really spike it out; it was bleached blonde and cut to be choppy and a little long in the front. They weren’t quite bangs, but there was enough to tie off into Anime-style spike-bangs.  I wore my dark brown Kikwear jeans with 42″ leg-openings, my blue/white/silver Airwalks (the later “clodhopper” style), a white t-shirt with DeNiro from taxi driver front-and-center, and my black Kikwear jacket that I thought looked rather dashing with its shiny metal zipper.

I had my mom take a photo (pictured right); It wasn’t that I thought I might not be coming back, I just felt like that was a moment that I wanted to have captured on film.

In retrospect, I may not have known it, but my decision to get onto that plane was probably the most life-changing choice I had made up to that point. Continue reading →