I’ll tell you one of my most memorable dates. I was just thinking about it this past week. It was February 14th, 2004. It was Valentine’s Day 2004, and I was in college at the time and I took my girlfriend out to TCBY. That was, for you young folks, it was yogurt. Like, frozen yogurt. And then we went to Barnes & Noble and we each looked for books that we wanted to read, and then we went and we just found a place within Barnes & Noble to read them together, and that was the date. And we both loved it. We would speak about it lovingly as time went on, like, “Ah, remember that date? That was wonderful. The frozen yogurt and just reading at Barnes & Noble.” I stand by it. You know, sometimes it’s not always like what you do but who you’re doing it with, and we both loved reading and I’m fond of frozen yogurt, so it worked out.
And now the reason it was on my mind recently is because I was watching a hockey game, Red Wings were playing the Canadiens at a home-and-home to end the regular season, and the Canadiens had a rookie from Holland, Michigan who, I found out, was — he was born on February 14th, 2004. And I was struck. I’m not sure if I have known this feeling before. I was struck with the notion that it’s just kind of strange that — I remember exactly what I was doing that day. I was eating frozen yogurt and reading at Barnes & Noble with my lovely girlfriend at the time, and it’s just strange to be like, “Wow, just a few miles up the way, you know, a future NHL phenom was born right now.” It could have been happening while I was ordering frozen yogurt.
It’s kind of strange, you know, I — when you get older there’s certain things that just — for the most part, I just live my life like I always have. But every now and again you get these things that pop up where it’s like, “Oh, weird. I remember that day very well. I was an adult already, and I remember exactly what I was doing when this person was born.” So, that’s my story. That’s my date.