Whaaaaaaaaat?

When you embark on a potentially multi-year journey to teach English in Japan, you have a lot of expectations.  You expect to be tired, you expect to be nervous, and you expect tearful goodbyes from family and friends.

What you don’t expect is the return of a decade-plus friendship long thought lost to history.

I arrived at the JFK American Airlines terminal at 8 a.m., as instructed by the travel agency, fully prepared for the 12-hour flight.  Two other new JETs were standing nearby, so I joined them.  I had met Matt at the New York City orientation before, but the other guy I hadn’t seen before.  He introduced himself, but I couldn’t keep his name in my head to save my life.  He looked passingly familiar for reasons I couldn’t pin down.  As more JETs arrived, it became increasingly clear that the travel agents were about to break their own cardinal rule (“don’t be late!”), as the designated 9 a.m. arrival time fast approached.  I stopped trying to place this new guy in my memory, and instead figured I’d met him at Dickinson once before, and would get to know him better this time around.  Then we queued up to check in our luggage (the agents were on time after all), and I saw his luggage tag was from Xavier University.  Bummer.

But then:  David Marshall.

A brief history: In sixth grade, my friend Eric and I hung out with a kid named David Marshall, and we were all in some way, shape or form interested in similar things.  Pokémon, wrestling, video games, what have you.  After a great first year, David transferred to another middle school, and ended up attending a different high school from Eric and myself as well.  Eric and I remained great friends, but we lost touch with David entirely.

I had to get to the bottom of this increasingly curious mystery.

“Hey man, where are you from?”

“Just outside of Philadelphia, in New Jersey.”

Check.

“Where did you go to middle school?”

“King’s Christian.” A puzzled look.

Bzzzt.  That wasn’t ringing a bell, and it certainly wasn’t the answer I was looking for.

“Hmm.  You didn’t go to Glen Landing?”

“Well yeah, for a year.”  Now he’s kind of looking at me like I’m some sort stalker.

Check!  I smile and laugh to myself.  This HAS to be him.

“You don’t remember me, do you?  Jeff Wilson.”  I offer my hand for a shake.  ”We used to hang out with Eric Rudderow?”

His face lights up.

“NO WAY!”

Neither of us could believe it.  Surely, this was the stuff of Hollywood movies, not real life!  David went on to Xavier University, majored in Criminal Justice and took Japanese when his preferred language, Italian, was full and closed for the semester (sorry, Victoria!).  Like many of us recent college grads, he had trouble finding a job, and thought the JET Program might be a nice alternative to just working for cash.  And the rest is history waiting to be written.  He’s now teaching in Ishikawa Prefecture on the west coast of Japan, about 3 prefectures south of me.  The world works in mysterious ways, does it not?

We both felt better about the long flight ahead.  Then we lived it.