09/09/09 and 09/09/99. which is better? hard to tell.

Tomorrow is 09/09/09. I’ve been waiting for this day for 10 years. Not really waiting in the chewing-my-fingernails, on-tenterhooks (what does that phrase even means?) sense of the word, more in the every now and then I think about this date sense. And it’s for the randomest reason.

Ten years ago tomorrow, Alli, Mona, and I were in the Poconos for a vacation, staying at the Galkin’s lake house, and thoroughly enjoying the cable television in the living room. At the time,our home TV only had three channels – ABC, NBC, and CBS, and ABC was the only one with solidly reliable reception (hence: lots of Oprah and General Hospital in our childhood memories). Anyway, we we were enjoying the cable, especially the MTV (!). To a 7^th-grader without cable having MTV for days straight is akin to the nirvana my I felt the first time I watched listened to Julie Andrews sing Camelot. Anyway, that year, the MTV video music awards were held on 9/9/99, which seemed like the coolest date EVER. I remember thinking that the next decade would be full of really fun dates, like 01/01/01, and 06/06/06. Frankly, I don’t remember a thing about any of those dates (okay, vague recollection that I was relieved the world didn’t get on 01/01/01), but I do remember figuring out how old I’d be in 2009, and thinking that I wouldn’t even recognize the 23-year-old me.

I suppose that’s partially true. I still look the same (maybe the glasses are a little less egregious, and my teeth aren’t sticking out at entirely un-human-ly angles) and I’m still over-enthusiastic, into putting on a show, and a bookworm of sorts. I’m pretty much sure I know less than I did in 7^th grade (I did go to the 1999 PA State Geography Bee, after all), and I certainly read less (much to my chagrin). But in a lot of ways, I’m really happy where I’ve landed, especially because of what tomorrow represents.

Tomorrow, we release our 50 State study of the house climate and energy bill, ACES, where we document the savings from energy efficiency and talk about how the bill could be made better for consumers and the economy. It’s pretty exciting stuff (well, I think it is), and it’s being released by Environment America in 41 different states. I’m really happy about the fact that I was the lead author on a major national report, and I’ve only been at the organization 9 months – I feel like I’ve learned more than I could possibly document here, but I’m most excited about what I DON’T know – politics is still new to me, and the possibilities of delving further into this fascinating world seem at this moment to be endless (we’ll see how I feel after tomorrow, but that’s how it feels tonight). Time for bed; Hill briefing in the morning (!).