August 31, 2000 was a day that changed my life forever.
Sure it was my 18th birthday…the day I became an adult. But it was also the first day that all 5 of the original Jerky Girls ever hung out together.
Courtney, my college roommate, had put together a little birthday surprise for me in our dorm room, but enlisted the help of our next door neighbor, Loren, to decorate while we were out to dinner. Loren needed some help so she enlisted the help of her new friend Becky, whom she met through something musical (I can’t quite remember all the details…I just remember popsicles were involved!). So Courtney and I get home that night and enjoy a little surprise birthday celebration with Loren, Becky, and our suite mates. Not long after a random girl, Jenn, comes running down to our room and says, “Hey I heard there was cake in here! Can I have some?” So right there in room 209 all 5 of us met for the first time.
Shortly after that the 5 of us became inseparable and all ended up living on the same floor together. Right before Christmas we decided that we needed a name and came up with Jerky Girls because we wanted to be the girl version of the MTV show Jackass. We had grand plans of me getting a video camera for Christmas and Loren was going to get a video editing program for Christmas and then we would all come back and film each of us doing incredibly stupid things. However, none of that happened…except that I did get the camera and we were constantly doing incredibly stupid things!
Throughout the four years at UMHB we inducted two other members into our Jerky Girl group…
Sij – Sijansky was randomly selected as one of mine and Courtney’s roommates our sophomore year.
Kesi – Kes lived in the apartments across the street from us and somehow one night she convinced Courtney and I to help her go around the dorms surveying people about their views on sex…don’t worry it was for a psychology project and was totally legit!
In 4 years together we did some of the dumbest, most hilarious, random, and ridiculous things together. Here are just a few of the highlights…
1. Dressing up in our Easter dresses when we got back to school and going to get ice cream together
2. Dressing up in all black and walking through campus with boom boxes and ending up at the Ruins where we proceeded to do cheerleading stunts together our senior year
3. Camping out in the quad on the last night before summer our freshman year
4. Having wheelchair races at the hospital in the middle of the night while the doctors figured out whether to remove Jenn’s appendix or not
5. Pretending we’re thugs and going to spy on Brian Rayburn to defend the honor of our friend Amy
6. Kesi writing the most AMAZING song about the boy who broke my heart and then all carpooling to his school to serenade him with his special song
7. Road trips to all of our hometowns
8. HUGE blow out fights between Courtney, Becky, and myself
9. Creating our own Jerky Girl choreographed dance at semi-formal senior year
10. Becky showing up randomly in the morning dressed exactly like Courtney or I so that we would have to change before class
We are a true example of how opposites attract! We are five of the most uniquely different people, but since we helped each other survive college we are forever bonded together.
When we graduated college we decided that every 2nd weekend in June we would get together for a Jerky Girls weekend and take a trip somewhere. This last for about the first 3 years after college where we visited New Braunsfels, Austin, and Port Aransas.
Then life got in the way and we kinda let the weekend slip off of our calendars.
Even so we’ve survived a lot with each other even after college and even without the yearly get togethers.
We’ve dealt with parents having major illnesses.
We’ve lost parents.
We’ve encouraged through a called off wedding.
We’ve celebrated one marriage and two current engagements.
After all that we decided it had been too long and a week ago we got together for a Jerky Girl trip to Fort Worth.
This was the first time that all 7 of us have been together since college!
There aren’t enough words to describe the fun and laughter that occurred during this short two day trip together!
So I’ll just show some highlights with pictures…
An impromptu lingerie shower for Courtney since we all missed her real one!
Dinner out with our matching shirts…lots of strange looks that night!
Sij and I enjoying some “goodies” out on the dance floor!
Looking forward to us all wearing our matching white dresses to the wedding and showing everyone our Jerky Girl choreographed dance out on the dance floors this summer!
“What do we do when a member’s in help?” – Becky
“We give them trouble?” - Jerks
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