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12 Days of Christmas - Day 4

 Well.... since I don't have any memories from Germany.. I have to pull from mine from good old backwoods Pennsylvania. Other than a few flashes of the German country side, the Swiss Alps and some old buildings in Rome, I don't have much SO, I'll be reciting a regaling tale from the hottest spot in State College - good ol' College 9 theater. Seriously what the heck did people DO before College 9? They had to drive all the way out to where the MALL was and admittedly that was a better theater but College 9 didn't have to be better, just THERE.

College 9 was the site of many a Kennedy family outing. It is where we watched the last two Harry Potter movies, The Hunger Games, and MANY other movies - some bad, some good, all in the midst of pop soaked and popcorn covered floor. Anyway, it was the summer of 2017 - meaning we were moving to Michigan in a few weeks (if not a couple days) and there were 2 things I was going to miss when we left: 

1. The Pennsylvania location - State College was familiar, where I had grown up, and naturally very beautiful.

2.  My best friend Krissy. The one who had informed my stupid choir teacher that I had graduated early by replying, "She's in Germany" when he asked the choir where I had been the past few weeks, who had driven home with me when we had an early dismissal and we were sliding all over the already snow slick roads, and who continued to have lunch with me when all the rest of my loser friends abandoned me cause I didn't like their swearing. Krissy was a good, tv loving, field hockey playing, singing gal who I met one fateful day in Tech Ed :) 

One of the last things we did together - since I had graduated early and been on escapades to Ireland, Germany and Universal since January - was go and see Wonder Woman one late night at College 9. I had already seen it I think 3 times - once with Mommy, once with Cole, and once with the rest of my family (I would see it for a 5th time when Hannah unexpectedly came home from her mission for a quick 6 weeks). Attending the last showing for the night, we were one of the only ones in the tiny theater (that had an unstoppable air conditioner that made the theater FREEZING) located at the end of the row of all the theaters. I don't remember much else other than at the end of the movie, both of us were SOBBING silently, Krissy's head was resting on my shoulder and my head was on top of hers as we cried, partially from the AMAZING movie that Wonder Woman was and partially cause we knew this would be one of  the last if not the final time we would see each other for a long while - especially since we were both going off to school and bigger and greater things than little old State College. 

I don't know why that is one of my favorite memories fo my adolescence because it is pretty dang sad, but I think it was because it encompassed everything I loved from PA. After I dropped off Krissy at home, I even stopped at good ol' Circleville park, it now being about 1 a.m. in the morning. I parked and cried under the crystal clear skies of State College.

I think Heavenly Father knew I needed someone else in my life to be a good friend because that summer was my last at Interlochen and the one where I met Gretchen, my Michigan, horn playing BFF that accompanies us to Halloweekends every year. Summer of 2017 was one full of a LOT of memories, all of them good, but some of them sad :)

Anyway, Merry Christmas, Mama, this isn't exactly four calling birds, but hope you like it :)

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