10 years later reality still has some sting

By Scott Deininger
SPECIAL TO THE HERALD NEWS

"Are you going out tonight?" I asked around 5:30 while she was driving home from work.

All I heard on the other end of the line was a huge, seemingly shocked laugh as if to suggest, "Are you nuts? It's a Tuesday night."

Times had changed and perhaps it sunk in right at that point. Even my single friends weren't game for going out during the week. However, with a little coaxing and promises of funny stories and bizarre observations, she agreed to meet up.

We both knew that we were pretty much each other's only option for any socializing on this night. All the rest of our friends were either home with their families. Or ... home with their families.

My friend and I, both fresh from our 28th birthdays, had been down similar paths. We both lived on our own in Chicago only to move back in with our parents where we live today.

"Did you see the letter about our 10-year reunion? It's this year, my dear," I said as the comedy wheels began turning.

"Don't remind me. I have about six months to make something of myself or at least move out again," she replied with some discontent.

With that, I began reflecting on where the time had gone and what I had to show for the 10 years since high school.

When I was growing up, I often heard adults say how times flies and how things will get old really soon. The other day I was telling someone how times had changed, using "my sister having a cell phone at 16" as an example.

"It's ridiculous. When I was 16, I didn't have a cell phone," I said. "And I didn't even know what the Internet was. The only time I used two Ws in succession was for a wrestling organization."

I thought that by 28, I would have graduated college, landed a good job, bought a house, gotten married and had at least one child. In that order, the order that has come to be the prototypical American dream.

My dream has shaped out a bit differently. Aside from finishing up at Joliet Junior College back in the spring of 1996, the aforementioned American prototypes have escaped me. And have done so by virtue of choice.

Ten years ago, I never thought that by age 28 I would have worked and traveled with a professional football team, the Arizona Cardinals in 1997, seeing 20 games from either the sidelines or the coach's booth.

I surely wouldn't have bet the house on me doing over 800 standup comedy shows in 29 states and three countries, including two trips to Japan and Korea for our U.S. military troops.

I did think that I would've kept considerably more hair though. But even being bald can't trump the travel, the football and the comedy experiences.

People say that one day you'll come to a fork in the road and make a decision. Some would guess that I, truly being my mother's son, would pick up the fork, dust it off, and look for a spoon and a knife to make a complete set.

Maybe the decision I've made is to use none of those utensils at all. Instead, I'm using the spork and we'll see where that takes me.

 

Scott Deininger, who goes by Scott Derenger for comedy work, is a traveling standup comedian living in Shorewood. For Scott's Chicago land comedy schedule or to e-mail him, refer to his Web site, ShaveYourHead.com

01/19/03