It's a small world after all; no, really, it is!

So I tried to keep a running tally of the things I wanted to share from the past three weeks as I was debating whether to start a blog, but of course I’m having a tough time recalling everything on command when I begin to write. My apologies beforehand for straying from a coherent timeline; I will be jumping around from story to story as I am reminded of them.

Which brings me to this: Two weekends ago, my co-workers invited me to a poker game at this place called Carney Park (don’t worry, I’ll get back to the poker part). The rumored back story behind Carney Park is that the Navy bought a large, empty piece of land from Italy in the 60s and turned it into a recreation area complete with soccer and baseball fields, volleyball and basketball courts, a swimming pool, cabins, tent sites for camping, etc. It’s actually kind of bizarre, because all of this is enclosed in a large crater, with wall-like hills surrounding the flat park. And unfortunately, you need a car to get to it (I hitched a ride with a co-worker; many of the enlisted Navy guys buy beat-up old cars since they are here for two or three years).

It definitely did not feel like we were in Italy; we grilled hamburgers and ate s’mores! As for the poker game itself, it turns out that despite hailing from Vegas, I have no talent for poker (and no beginner’s luck) and ended up the second player eliminated. Side note: Will eventually won, after about 5 hours of play, although that is counting the time we spent lingering outside waiting for firemen because someone thought it was okay to smoke inside and set the fire alarm off! Genius.

And now for the truly crazy part of this story: I was talking to my co-worker, Colby, over hamburgers and somehow we got onto the topic of Northwestern and Illinois in general. He casually mentions that his family is originally from Illinois, so I naturally ask, “where?” just in case I’ve heard of it. Well, he says that his father is from Aurora and I say no way, that’s where my dad is from too! But it didn’t stop there. Not only are both our dads from Aurora, but they went to high school at Marmion together, only a few years apart! I asked my dad about it later and he remembers Colby’s father and uncles, although my dad’s friends were closer to them than he was. It was weird – of all the places in the world, of all the people I could meet/work with, and here is this connection. I’ve proclaimed it my “Small World Story #2” (I don’t think anything will beat running into a freshman year high school classmate in a Guatemalan hostel – but prove me wrong, world!).