17 YEARS AGO

Seventeen years ago...

I was 15 years old;
a freshman in high school;
competing in my first high school swimming state championship meet;

and

snowed in at Penn State University.


Seventeen years ago this weekend was the Blizzard of 1993. Commonly referred to as the STORM OF THE CENTURY.

As a teenager, being snowed in at a hotel with a group of your best friends was a dream come true. Things at Penn State were crazy that weekend. On Saturday, the officials at the swim meet completely rearranged the meet schedule. Instead of having preliminary heats in the morning and finals at night, the meet was shortened and swum in a timed finals format. We were finished completing before noon on Saturday.

Our season was over. And it was a good one.

And we were ready to celebrate.

We spent countless hours outside playing in 27 inches of freshly fallen snow. We searched unsuccessfully for the Penn State hot springs. We had snow ball fights. We jumped into snow piles 15 or so feet high. We watched other swimmers sledride down the street on car mats. We watched one too many episodes of Beavis and Butthead (the show premiered the weekend of the Blizzard). We got in a little bit of trouble with the hotel staff (just a little bit!).

It was one of the best weekends of high school.

We went back home with memories for a lifetime.

To think that it all happened 17 years ago makes me feel old.