Found.

I feel as if, suddenly, my life is coming back together. As if, it is suddenly falling into place. It started with yesterday night--or maybe even before that. But I started realizing it yesterday night.

Yesterday night, while I was uploading songs onto my new iPod Nano (Thanks, Mom & Dad for getting it for me, even after I told you you didn't have to get me anything at all), I looked at the kitchen counter and saw a blue cellphone. A little confused, I walked toward it, picked it up, and saw that I was not mistaken; it was the same cellphone that had been stolen this past May. The same cellphone that I had called, upon finding out that it was missing, and had been answered by an older woman with a foreign accent. I quickly plugged it into my father's charger and saw that the background was a picture of me, Sadie and Derek from last May. It really was my phone.

I was utterly shocked. I went through all my old pictures and reminisced about the good old days; when friends had been close and I didn't have to plan a trip out to a college campus I knew nothing about to see the people I care about most. I talked to my mother and she said she found it in her van, which was a vehicle I had searched up and down in order to try and locate that phone. But I bought into that story until 15 minutes ago, when it hit me that it didn't add up. I'm not saying my mother is lying; I don't think she is. But if my phone was in the van the entire time, then who was that woman I talked to? Did I hallucinate the entire conversation that went a little like this:

Me: "Hello?"
Woman: "Hello?"
Me: "Who is this?"
Woman: "Vat?"
Me: (Hearing the weird accent and figuring it was Di playing a joke on me) "Di, I need Katherine's number."
Woman: "Vat?"
Me: "I need Katherine's number."
Woman: "Who? Who's numver?"
Me: "Di, stop it. I need Katherine's number right now. Can you look in my phone and get it?"
Woman: "Kath-err-een who?"
Me: "Katherine. DeVoursney."
Woman: "Va-"
Me: "Di. I'm serious. Shut up and get me her freaking number."
Woman: "Va-"

And then I hung up. Did I hallucinate that entire freaking conversation, because I must have if my mother found the cellphone in our van, which I firmly believe she did. But I guess I've drifted away from my life coming into place. Well, that part of my cellphone story is insanely odd and I don't know what to think about it; I seriously feel like I'm in some lame Disney movie or something.

But then, today I saw Erik and Bryan at the mall, which in itself was nice. I haven't seen Erik in a long time, so I planned on hanging out with both of them tonight. So I got home and Deb told me that she was having a party at her place. This was perfect, since I'm leaving for Chicago tomorrow and wanted to see everyone before I left. So I said I would be there, and left at around 8:30 with Lauren. When we got there, not a lot of people were there, but slowly people trickled in and it ended up being a really enjoyable night. Toward the end of the night, a bunch of us ended up crowded around Debra's dinner table just talking, and as I looked around, I realized it was the gang from last year. Seriously, it was most of us, minus a few of the guys that were too cool to show up to Deb's. I just looked around the table and smiled, thinking about how all the pictures that I had been looking at in my phone were suddenly very real and how everything was reminding me of better days.

I felt a rightness and a sense of home that I haven't felt in a long time. The entire thing mad me feel so happy and full that, when people starting getting up to go home, I didn't feel sad; I was just content.

So that in itself was enough to make my Christmas Break complete, but then when I got home I talked to Di. She had been at the party Mandi had held for all the AMUN kids, that I had decided to skip. She asked me if I had a blue corduroy jacket that I had lost with a pin about being loved on it. I said I did, but I lost it about a year ago in the debate van. As it turns out, Mandi found it.

Somehow, after all of these months, Mandi found the blue corduroy jacket that I splurged on and gotten last December. But that's not the most significant thing; the most significant thing is the "I am loved" pin that is on that coat. Yes, I realize it's a totally lame pin, but it stands for something so much greater than that. One of our good friends, I can't remember if it was Deb or Marissa or whomever, had started off with that pin, and one day, it had fallen off her purse. So instead of pinning it back on, she gave it to another friend and was like "Here. You are loved." It started a tradition. Whoever had the pin would keep it until it fell off, when they would pass it to one close friend within our group. It was slightly lame, but at the same time, really cool, because it represented that closeness that we all shared, that feeling of family.

I guess last December I had gotten the pin, and I had put it on that jacket. And then, I lost the jacket, and as time passed, some of those friends faded and we weren't nearly as close as we used to be. And then tonight, not even an hour after I get back from the party where we all came together again, my sister says she found the jacket, but more importantly, the pin.

I don't know. Maybe it's all nothing and I'm looking too far into it. But all of those things, plus Sarah Keep's party last week, plus getting all of my college things in, plus writing a column for the newspaper finally, plus everything about my future pretty much coming together--it all just seems like my life is seriously turning around.

I felt like I hit rock bottom last Thursday, and then yesterday everything started coming together and getting better. I have to believe it represents something greater than all of those individual things.

It's like Synergy, the idea coined my Milton Wolf. When the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, that is synergy. This is synergy. All of those things alone don't add up to what the entirety of those things happening represents to me. Alone, they are just events, but together, they represent rebirth. How appropriate for Winter. How appropriate for the end of the year. Synergy is occuring. It is surrounding me.

My life is synergy. I am synergy. And it feels good.