Recently, I bumped into someone who I was very close with in the Summer of 1998 and it got me thinking about that summer in particular and how that summer meant so much to my life in so many ways.

From the time I was sixteen to February of 1998, I was involved in four serious relationships and basically went from one to the other without that much space between them to be “single”. During the time I was involved in these relationships, I did not have that many friends or that much time to experience “the single life” – whatever that means. When you spend the first ten straight years of your adulthood this way, a lot of bent up emotions, desires and missed experiences accumulate inside of you. Sometimes, it was my choice to spend every waking moment with the woman I was with – and sometimes, I wasn’t “allowed” to live any other way. So for ten years, whether by choice or by force, I was somebody’s boyfriend and not my own person.

But when the summer of 1998 came around, I was a twenty-six year old guy that was single for the first time since he was sixteen, so as far as I was concerned, I had ten years of catch up living to do. For the first time in my adult life, I was able to go where I wanted to go and do what I wanted to do. My life was my own and now that I had no one holding me back – I intended to live it – to the fullest.

They say that when you live through an experience, you can’t really analyze it until time passes and you have the opportunity to look back on it and reflect – and see it for what it really was. I can tell you now, almost two years later, that the summer of 1998 was many things to me, but more than anything else, it was important.

It was important because I needed to experience things in life that I never had before. Being a boyfriend for ten years straight with only a week or two break in between, I missed out on a lot. I never experienced going out with “the boys” until the sun came up; I never had a party at “my” house that ended only when everyone passed out; I never had more than five friends at a time – and most importantly – I never experienced just letting go and living for myself without any cares or worries. I can say now with no regret or remorse that in the span of only five months, I lived those ten years – and then some.

I had all of the elements necessary for catching up on ten lost years – I had my own place, a job that needed me just a few hours a week but paid me a full week’s salary – and dozens of friends that would come by almost regularly. So almost each and every day, I partied and hung out and experienced many things I never did before. I went from somebody’s boyfriend to somebody. I lived a lot, I laughed a lot – and I loved a lot. I met more people and went more places then I ever had before – I even got a tattoo – but most importantly, I let the “single guy” that was imprisoned inside of me for ten years free for the first time.

But now that it’s over I realize that as I look back on it now, the summer of 1998 could not have come at a better time, because now I feel that all of the “living” I needed to do is done, and I can face the future with Sandy never feeling that I missed out on anything. How ironic that the living I “needed” to do was done before I met the woman I want to live with forever.

I can honestly say that although during the summer of 1998, I never wanted it to end – now that it has – I do not miss it. I will however, always cherish that summer and know that while the places and the people of that summer are gone – the memories of that summer will always live with me – always.