On this very day, June 14, back in 2004 was the day Bryan, Rhodalyn, Sharine and I all crossed paths. I was 11yrs old and the other two girls were 12 years old. This significant day is the 18th anniversary our first day of school in high school. Yeah, you read that right. It’s a long story, but in short, we had a different school curriculum back then. Bryan, at the time, was a 13-year-old sophomore and all of us were turning a year older within that year.
Since I studied elementary school in a city in the complete opposite direction of my high school, I was unfamiliar with the place and the school itself. Our school was Pangasinan State University, Bayambang Campus. It has lots of different colleges and they have their own high school and elementary school within the same campus. It’s a large area, there were lots of buildings and huge trees that I got lost once while in the process of my high school application. However, I do admit that it takes me a while to figure out places and my own location. There weren’t any GPS yet at this time people!
My cousin, who recently graduated from the same high school the year before, was there for her first day of school for college. She had the foresight that I might get lost again and probably need supervision in finding my way so she introduced me to Bryan before classes started. Bryan was the first person I ever met in high school, and he wasn’t even my classmate. Soon, I became friends my classmates, Sharine and Rhodalyn. Sharine and I got to know each other more because we were from the same town and both rode the same public transportation on our way home. And as for Rhodalyn, she has no recollection on how we became friends, we have no idea any either. Nonetheless, we’re still friends until now and that’s what matters.
Despite the fact that we hardly share anything in common in terms of our personalities, all of us had high hopes, dreamed big and just always had a good laugh when we’re together.
And now, 18 years later, we’re still the goofy high school kids. Still enjoying the company of each other. Soon enough we will be telling our scholars —
“We’ve been friends long before you were even born.”
— Bliss Founders