I remember driving to Bridal Cave with the Schepmanns and Roger kept singing "Going to the chapel and Mark's gonna get married".

I remember occasionally going to a drive-in for lunch when in high school.

I remember doing cleaning on the 4th floor of Park West I on Science Drive, listening to WORT, and hearing "La Femme D'Argent" by Air for the first time.

I remember how much I loved rainstorms as a child. Still do.

I remember walking down a hallway in St. Mary's hospital with Dad in the middle of the night when I had croup, and he reminisced about when I was born there.

I remember eating s'mores at a Campfire Girl outing.

I remember calling my mother around midnight one night while I was babysitting because one of the children was coughing and breathing oddly. She came over to check and assured me that the baby was all right.

I remember the only time I ever babysat for money was Brandon and Darren Sharp.

I remember as a child riding in the car back from Bessie asking my mother why the cow we passed had its tail in the air.

I remember the first time I saw a wild turkey I was at Hickory Haven by myself and it kind of freaked me out.

I remember cutting my own hair when I was at St. John's College.

I remember following DP from St. Louis to Jeff City once, and he had a mattress in the back of a pickup, and rain threatened.

I remember the fiercest rainstorm I'd ever experienced was coming back from a family vacation to Chicago.

I remember how fast the silver maple seemed to grow after Dad transplanted it into our backyard at 5288.

I remember that Bill Giezentanner, a classmate of mine in high school, gave me a sheaf of poems he had written.

I remember in 5th grade we got extra credit for sharing brief synopses of news stories with the class, and eventually Mrs. Stegall had to deny credit to the girl who always just told us the number of days the Iran hostage crisis had lasted so far.

I remember Mrs. Hogan was the sweetest teacher I had in high school.

I remember my mother wearing a hat to church almost every Sunday when I was a little girl.

I remember only one time that Grandma was stern with us kids, when Mom and Dad weren't there and we didn't want to go to bed.

I remember eating popcorn balls -- but I can't remember where or who made them.

I remember enjoying ending my radio show on KWAR with the Throbbing Gristle song "Subhuman".

I remember that we had a stove at 5288 that had a double oven.

I remember Mom sometimes turning on the open oven to heat the kitchen on cold winter mornings.

I remember my mom usually had a pot of spaghetti waiting for us when we arrived in Oklahoma City.

I remember walking from Hebron Hall to Centennial Hall with a shy quiet girl named Amy when we ran into Danielle and Nicole, and Danielle said she'd heard about Chris being arrested.

I remember Louise and I took turns helping with the dishes every night: one night I would wash and she would dry and the next night reversed.

I remember my first email address was mlueth19@aol.com.

I remember my cousin Susie could never cook pudding without it burning.

I remember Rani, Matthew, and JP who worked at the Days Inn in Neenah where I stayed every other Wednesday for nearly a decade.

I remember how cold and gusty the winter winds were in Kansas and Nebraska.

I remember the Hwy 18 towns that marked progress on the trips I took between Waverly and Madison -- West Union (Lester's hometown), Postville (Tharin's hometown), Prairie Du Chien, Dodgeville, Verona.

I remember learning how to square dance in sixth grade at Harmony School.

I remember playing the song Paisley Park by Prince for Dad.

I remember how Louie used to run outside and roll in the grass -- or dirt -- every time he came back from the groomer's.

I remember Mom reading Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut on my recommendation.

I remember my mother had to take the dirty laundry outside and down into the basement room in order to do the wash.

I remember sitting on the deck of Art Firley's condo at night, looking out over the Lake of the Ozarks.

I remember our family staying in the basement of Christ Lutheran Church during tornado warnings.

I remember always going to Pennsylvania Ave on 26th St. because of the poor visibility when turning onto Penn from 25th.

I remember walking 898 steps to the top of the Washington Monument.

I remember watching soap operas like General Hospital and Days Of Our Lives with Danielle during summer breaks in probably the mid 1980's.

I remember how beautiful the green rolling hills of Pennsylvania were.

I remember the closet where Grandma kept all the board games and all the VHS cassettes of stuff she'd taped from TV.

I remember traveling on the first U. S. interstate highway in Pennsylvania -- a dream compared to the two-lane roads we had been on.

I remember buying MP3 players and digital cameras and digital audio recorders before phones could do all that.

I remember on the way home from our trip that we stopped to see the Liberty Bell.

I remember many many Wednesday nights spent at the Days Inn in Neenah, WI.

I remember the neighborhood in Philadelphia had tall houses so close together that you could barely walk between them without turning sideways.

I remember reluctantly dropping off a Wartburg international student late at night on a deserted Missouri Western State University campus and giving her Chris's phone number so she could call me if her friends failed to show up to get her as she assured me they would.

I remember that we went to another Air Force buddy's house in Philadelphia.

I remember the first time I entered Joe's Knight Hawk in Waverly was early one evening when Todd Letsche wanted to get something to eat, and I tried one of Joe's famous (deservedly so, it turned out) burritos while Todd wolfed down two of them with no drink.

I remember riding a three-speed, hand-brake bike at Smitty's and being thrown off of it when I clasped the brakes too quickly and tightly.

I remember the overcast day in 1990 when I borrowed Lester's falling-apart car for my first ever real job interview where I sat with my tie and my long rain-damp hair and nervously babbled and lied about trivialities like what music I liked.

I remember that Smitty had twin girls that were about my age, and they were fascinated by the fact that we were from Oklahoma - asking questions like - "Do you have any trees in Oklahoma?" "Are there really Indians living there?" "Are any of the Indians dangerous?"

I remember asking Gretchen's dad if he'd ever been in any accidents as a truck driver as we drove back from my place after dropping off the desk I'd bought from his graduating daughter.

I remember we first visited "Smitty" and his family in Falls Church, VA.

I remember when DP was in first grade he and I walked from South School to Meng and Phung's house for some reason.

I remember in my adult years that Mom told me that in the motel rooms on our long trip she and Dad would play strip poker at night after we three kids were asleep. She said, "There was no TV in motels back then. What else could we do?"

I remember Lori and Rachel and Lee Lee Holmes and their Alaskan Malamute named Apache who was good-natured but not suited for hot Missouri summers.

I remember on our trip that Dad would go in to inspect the motel room for cleanliness, lack of bugs, and plumbing before paying for the night.

I remember cigarette vending machines in restaurants with all the knobs that would give you a pack for probably well under a dollar back in the late 70's early 80's.

I remember most of the highways we traveled back east were two-lane, and I got nervous every time Dad had to pass a slow truck.

I remember being able to get glass bottles of soda (Mr. Pibb?) for 15 cents from the old timey drink machine in the board office basement where Mom worked.

I remember that I taught myself to knit on our trip to the east coast and made a red sweater -- which I rarely wore.