The Seven
Ten years ago, I moved to Los Angeles to study
at the most prestigious film school in the country.
The glamour and excitement of studying at the same
institution that produced filmmakers like George
Lucas, Robert Zemeckis and Ron Howard made for a
heady experience. But what made it special from the
outset was the group of friends I made on my first
day.
The film program at USC covered the junior and
senior years, enabling one to take lower division,
general education courses elsewhere and transfer
into USC as a junior. That's exactly what I and six
other new classmates did, unintentionally giving us
something in common right from the start. When the
seven of us met at orientation, we instantly bonded
and became fast friends: a cornhusker from
Nebraska, a comedienne from Oregon, a versatile
prodigy from northern California, a local L.A.
Latina, a quirky Swiss creator, a jolly upstate New
Yorker, and me, a Navy vet from San Diego.
These friendships cemented and grew during our
time in school, as we spent all of our class time
together and worked on each others' film projects.
When we graduated, we went our separate ways for a
time, but largely kept in touch. Since then, most
of us have continued to work and play together to
some degree.
This weekend, I returned to Los Angeles to meet
up with my old friends and celebrate the 10-year
anniversary of our meeting. I haven't seen these
excellent people as much as I would have liked in
the last ten years, but our reunion felt like we'd
only just graduated. We went out to dinner, hit the
dance floor and drank shots like we were still in
college. As we hugged each other at the end of the
evening, I felt a bittersweet parting, hoping that
it wouldn't be another 10 years before we all got
together again.
©2003 Michael
Strickland ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED
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