Sometimes, the world is a truly bizarre place. There I am, stumbling through life and something thumps me and I can't help but blink and look around. Sometimes these things happen after a strongly felt impulse or craving. Two days ago, while working at Nicole's store, I succumbed to the urge I'd been feeling for over a day. I just had to draw a My Little Pony. Those of us of a certain age remember them and no, I don't mean the new ones that are on the market that are meant to appease us in the hopes of buying them for our children out of nostalgia... Anyway, I have never drawn a My Little Pony. Well, not one that was meant to look like the copyrighted image, at any rate, because I'm sure that as a little girl, I drew them and wrote stories to match, but they weren't copies of the design. As I was saying, I broke down and drew one. Not just any MLP, though, no, I created a Hippogriff. Hippogriffs are the offspring of a griffen and a mare - a truly rare occurence as mythology states that griffens prey on horses. Today, I was back at the store and brought with me my trusty greyscale markers and shaded her in. I put a vaguely Scythian symbol on her rump because hippogriffs turn up in Greco-Sythian mythology and I gave her the somewhat lame name of "Scythia". I am deeply proud of this weird bit of fanart.

Here's where the weirdness of the world comes into it. Like I said, I was really feeling the need to draw this. Today, not long after I set down my markers, finished with the drawing, two women about my age walked into the store. One of them popped her head through the beaded curtain to ask the price of the Hello Kitty Tarot and our eyes locked. Instant recognition took place and in stunned babble embraced. Krissy, a childhood friend with whom I'd lost touch with easily 18 years ago, was in Nicole's store, where I just happened to be. We had not seen each other since I graduated from highschool - er eight years earlier - and had not actually had a real friendship since we were little girls in elementary school. With Krissy I had played My Little Pony for hours on end. We used to get scolded by our grade one teacher for bringing our ponies and combing their manes and tails on the carpet when we were supposed to be listening to story time. Until fairly recently, I hadn't thought of a My Little Pony in years, and until she walked into the store today, I hadn't throught of Krissy in easily twice as long.

Naturally, I whipped out the picture and showed it to her and she squealed with delight and admitted that just the other day, she had her ponies out of their box and was looking at them. She was contemplating taking them back to Australia (where she now lives with her husband and has for two years) but wasn't sure if she should. It's amazing the roads our lives travel on. Ours diverged so many eons ago and got tossed back together seemingly out of the blue, and yet we both had a simultaneous urge to revist our favourite childhood toys...

Initially, Krissy and I bonded out of mutual segregation. The girls ostracised us as only little girls can because we came from Somewhere Else. In both our cases, that other place was the USA. Sure, I came from Brooklyn and she from Seattle, but it didn't matter - our US commonality gave us a bond. I don't really remember how our friendship began to fall apart. I think she was held back a grade and if I'm remembering correctly, I was really mad that she was - I thought it was unfair. Then I went into the French programme and like all of my friends, she kept in the English track. French Immersion broke up all but my most powerful friendships and we lost touch. Even though we went to highschool together, ours was a massive school and with never a class together, leading completely different lifestyles, we never reengaged.

Life is strange.